Insect pics, various

[Skittlebisquit]

Someone else likely has thought of it already, i didnt check
I really like bugs

Last summer

 

[Catherine Read]

I do love to photograph insects and arachnids, jumping spiders are my favourite

 

[Skittlebisquit]

I do love to photograph insects and arachnids, jumping spiders are my favourite

Those pics are fantastic! I found a web site for ID of spiders, i will try and remember

 

[Yeshuasdaughter]

Oh wow, you like spiders?

I don't have any pics, but I really like the fat, orange garden spiders that just sit lazily on their webs in between the garden vegetables. I think they're called "Orb Weavers". They are kind and shy. Almost like pets, really.

They don't mind humans at all, in fact they work in quiet harmony with us. If you touch their web, they'll skitter away, frightened, on their little legs. I very much relate with them. It seems like they just want to be loved for being helpful, and appreciated for being there.

They have such nice manners. Unlike those rude Wolf Spiders or Brown Recluse, an Orb Weaver will never jump at you, and they're never found inside anyone's home uninvited, even if you leave the door open.

We have had an amazing increase in the bat population this year, and I haven't seen so many of my fat, orange spider friends in the garden this past summer. I do miss them.

 

[Suzette]

I never kill a spider. I move to creepy ones like black widows and brown reclues out and try to give them an alternate shelter like a shed or rotten log.

Wolf spiders are simply amazing. I had one in my kitchen sink that actually came toward me instead of running away. Now that is chutzpah!

 

[watersprite]

I’m also a spider saver. Here is a recent visitor to the bathtub. They were re-located to the backyard.

I keep a light colored thin cardboard and a glass handy as they often end up indoors at this time of year.

 

[Yeshuasdaughter]

I’m also a spider saver. Here is a recent visitor to the bathtub. They were re-located to the backyard.

I keep a light colored thin cardboard and a glass handy as they often end up indoors at this time of year.
View attachment 70807

They almost always end up in the bathtub!

 

[watersprite]

They almost always end up in the bathtub!

Now that there is a cat here, it seems most of them become snacks for him.

 

[tree]

Now that there is a cat here, it seems most of them become snacks for him.

Crickets, even?

I have known cats who apparently liked to eat them,
but they'd cross their eyes while they were chewing.

 

[watersprite]

I thought only mice and scorpions like to eat crickets.
The cat likes grasshoppers and his “fussy cat” kibble. Grasshoppers are now much slower due to cold nights. Maybe buying crickets at the pet store during mid-winter, as a treat?

 

[Yeshuasdaughter]

I’m also a spider saver. Here is a recent visitor to the bathtub. They were re-located to the backyard.

I keep a light colored thin cardboard and a glass handy as they often end up indoors at this time of year.
View attachment 70807

I just started doing that too, thanks to this idea.

We caught a spider in a mason jar, and my daughter kept it as a pet for a day or so.

She named it "Underroos" after Tony Stark's nickname for Peter Parker.

Once she released it under a bush, we put the mason jar under the sink, for the next critter.

 

[Yeshuasdaughter]

I grew up wayyy out in the desert, and we didn't have a restroom in our house. At midnight, if I had to go to the bathroom, it meant walking across the pitch black yard to my grandma's house.

I'd often have to dodge the scorpions that lived under my grandma's sumac grove my father planted for her. We never really killed them, we let them live along side us.

My daddy taught me how to avoid them: Walk without vibrating the ground, and go around the back of them. They are stupid and if they can't see or sense you, you don't exist.

So I would occasionally have to do this light footed midnight dance around a scorpion in my path, so that it wouldn't see me.

*******

I remember one time I came home from school, and my dad had caught a giant red scorpion in a cereal jar. It was beautiful and intimidating. This was one kind of rare scorpion that we couldn't release. He was so venomous- one strike and a child or pet could die.

He filled the jar with about ten red ants and asked me which would win, and who would die? The giant scorpion, or the little ants. I felt so sorry for the ants and wanted to cry. He said this would be a life lesson.

The scorpion was unable to grab even one ant. They all worked together and attacked the soft spots in between his armor. By the end of the day, the scorpion was dead.

He asked me how it was possible. I said I didn't know. He then explained that it's the little people, doing small things in their lives, that made the most change, that affected the future, more than any large aggressor, and if we worked together for good, anything could be achieved.

 

[Yeshuasdaughter]

My friend posted this on her Facebook. I thought you'd be interested to see it. There are no plants in this photo.

 

[Rodafina]

Not an insect, but I think I got a photograph of a spider's exoskeleton after molting. I thought it was a tiny spider (it's about 1/4 the size of my pinky fingernail), but it didn't move for days. Upon closer inspection, it appears to be an exoskeleton left behind.