Monday, July 17, 2006

Eeeuuuwwww!

I'm not normally skittish about bugs (heck, I hardly blinked when G. plucked a tick off himself last night after dropping C. at camp), but when G. called me to look at this thing last night, I developed an unnatural fear of ever leaving the house again. As far as we can tell, it's a stag beetle. I believe we found the larvae when re-doing the front landscaping after having the tree removed (wish I'd have smooshed them all...). From what we've read, they can reach up to four inches. Luckily this one was only about two and a half inches long. {shudder}
The funniest part of the whole story (I think...) is that I spent the better part of an hour looking online to figure out what this thing was and if it would eat my plants. I showed the picture to T. on the tiny digital camera screen and his immediate reaction was, "Whoa! Stag beetle! cool!" I hate it that my kids are so much smarter than I am.

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6 comments:

Stefaneener said...

It's actually extremely cool-looking, although big. Do you guys have Jerusalem Crickets? My mom called them potato bugs. Talk about horrid. . .

suzee said...

Great minds - my comment was to be "but it's so COOL looking!"

The camp photos are great. *I* want to go to camp.

Anonymous said...

Cute little stag beetle... you know, they're not harmful to people or pets at all. Do they have prionus beetles in Wisconsin? Those are scary... 6 inches long with thick, segmented antennae.

Lainey said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Lainey said...

Hi - just wanted to drop by and thank you for your comments on my mitre square blanket on the MD KAL. I think stitching a sheet onto the back so you don't have to sew in the ends is a fantastic idea! If you go ahead and do it I'd love to see how it turns out. (eeww - bugs! yuck!)

Abby said...

Eww....I'd be freaking out with that, too. Look at those pinchers!