What is the most frightening critter you've found in your stuff?

[Mr. Ected]

I found about a 4" scorpion darting between some dirty towels I had in my bathtub. It took me forever to go back into that bathroom. Pulling those towels out one at a time was an exercise in skittishness I had never before experienced. Advice: ask someone else to do it.

[HopeHoops]

1. A drunk buddy from college.

Like six years after I graduated.

[Kali]

2. pssh scorpions are a regular occurrence around here

they hardly get me excited (unless they are in my bed)

I have a strange (and very severe) phobia of caterpillars and so the most frightening thing I have had happen was when the damn cat brought a big tomato worm into my bed. Talk about some panic!:scared:

[Mr. Ected]

3. I'd never heard of a tomato worm (WARNING: Critter Photo Attached)

Now my nightmares will never be the same. :scared:

[Kali]

5. OMG

a warning please! :spank:

[carlyhippy]

28. I am scared of most bugs, but catepillars dont bother me

that is a big sucker.

[REP]

10. Slugs

I have a strange and lifelong thing about slugs. Imagine my utter freakout when that cold thing I felt on my foot when we were eating dinner in an outdoor cafe one night turned out to be a slug. The freakout wasn't as bad as I would expect me to freakout - no barfing, stabbing my foot with a fork (I was wearing sandals) or crying, but I did say "getitoffgetitoffgetitoffgetitoffgetitoff" about a thousand times in two seconds while my husband removed it.

I have nearly the same level of weirdness about snails, and I have to go mano-a-feeler with them pretty often since I grow orchids outside, and snails fucking love eating orchids. Oddly enough, I think pictures and drawings of snails can be appealing, but up close and slimy - no.

[Crystal Clarity]

15. I'm the same way about slugs

I remember as a barefoot kid stepping on a big fat one and the feel of it's guts squishing up between my toes. The thought of that moment still gives me shivers of disgust to this day. Yuck! :puke:

[Kali]

24. oh yeah

those are way gross. I remember them from when we lived in California, ugh. Definitely in the getitoffmegetitoffmegetitoffme category, although for me not quite as irrationally, high pitched screaming while levitating sort of panic.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

4. Cats.

They really aren't frightening, but they're always in my stuff.

[Monique1]

6. Two things

First when my dog was a puppy and she was confined to the bathroom for litter box training. I looked in to talk to her and saw a scorpion on the edge of the tub. I quickly took down the gate to grab her as she was wanting to get near it. While holding her I grabbed bug spray - the thing would not die so I grabbed a toilet bowl brush, kept slamming the brush on it - the thing wouldn't die, finally got it and shook it down the garbage disposal - I kept the disposal on for quite some time. I've never saw one before in here and not since.

Another time someone brought items in my apartment - the items had mice in them! Hate those sneaky little creatures - got them all.

You don't know me but I don't tolerate this at all.

I contacted my management to let them know - but they said I didn't know what a scorpion looked like - I have lived in Az long enough to know what a scorpion looks like - and it is difficult to kill a scorpion. I think what happened was the people downstairs were campers. I bet they put their camping equipment in their bathtub and a scorpion was in it - it came up through the drain pipes.


As for the mice, many people caught hell from me - to this day it is still a sore spot with me.

[distantearlywarning]

7. Was once camping in Camp Verde, Arizona (Verde Hot Springs)

Was young and immortal and thought it would be no big deal if we didn't have a tent.

Woke up the next morning, pulled up my pillow to discover I'd been sharing my head space with a bark scorpion (the little ones, very toxic). :wow: :scared: :puke:

I was young and healthy, and I'm sure it wouldn't have killed me. But we were 3 miles of long, hot desert trail from our car and at least 60 miles from the nearest major medical center, and I would have been one damn sick puppy on the trip back.

[ornotna]

8. Crabs

I found crabs in my junk once.

[Burma Jones]

9. Either a Brown Recluse in my Sock Drawer or

a Timber Rattlesnake in my Tent's vestibule.

[LaurenG]

11. Vinegaroon - they resemble big scorpions

It was crawling on the ceiling so I swept it off with a broom and he squirted me.

Description: Vinegaroons have heavy mouthparts (pedipalps) that are formed into pincers. The first pair of legs is long and thin and is used like antenna to feel their way around. The next three pairs of legs are used for walking. The abdomen is attached widely to the head-thorax region (cephalothorax). The tail is long and thin suggesting a whip which is where the common name, "whipscorpion," originates for the order Uropygi. The only species that occurs in Texas is Mastigoproctus giganteus (Lucas) which is a vinegaroon in the family Thelyphonidae. Our Texas species is nearly black in color. Bodies of adults are 1 1/2 to 3 inches long. It is found primarily in west Texas especially in the Trans-Pecos region, but has been reported as far north as the Panhandle and in south Texas.
<snip>
Pest Status: Considered non-poisonous but they can pinch; capable of spraying a mist from scent glands at the base of the tail when disturbed. The mist produced by our species contains 85% concentrated acetic acid or vinegar, hence the name "vinegaroon."

click for a picture:
http://insects.tamu.edu/fieldguide/cimg365.html

[carlyhippy]

12. OMG! The first time I saw a vinegaroon I thought it was a giant scorpion ha

FREAKED me out big time!!! They are good, though. They kill scorpions, don't they? I was always told if I saw one outside to leave it alone.

[LaurenG]

13. Yes they are good - they eat roaches and other nasty bugs

They are startling to look at with their crab like claws and scary looking body but they are some of the good guys.

[carlyhippy]

14. ooh yuck I am SO GLAD I don't live in the desert SW anymore yikes

scorpions, tarantulas, vinegaroons, child of the earth, rattlesnakes, gila monsters. Cicadas were cool I guess, but they are pretty scary looking too.

I have always had this neurotic fear of scorpions, when I am down in the area visiting, even if my hair brushes across my neck I completely freak out. I had a scorpion, it was about 3 inches long and a pretty fat bugger, run across my foot in the house. I kicked him off my foot so hard he flew into the wall, and knocked him out. After I was finished screaming, I took a shoe and beat it until it was flat. That gives me chills just thinking about them.

[hedgehog]

26. Really puts the ocvcasional 4 ft snow storm we get around here into perspective.

[carlyhippy]

27. here too, the snow and below temps we get here, well those kind of critters just cant survive

thank goodness.

[sakabatou]

16. Opossum

[Javaman]

17. Define "stuff". nt

[grace0418]

18. I used to have regular nightmares about scorpions. I actually suspect it was because

there was a very terrible person in my life at the time who was a Scorpio. Those nightmares stopped when I left that job.

But scorpions themselves still make me shudder.

[Moondog]

19. Sand viper.

Between my boots. Sucker just missed me, but it sure woke me up in a hurry.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eALFp9kergM

[applegrove]

20. I had a paper wasp nest on my deck a few years ago. Having been stung by a nest of wasps at one

point in my life I was a little wary.

[Gidney N Cloyd]

21. Ex-girlfriend. nt

[denbot]

22. Not so much found, as "lost".

Many moons ago I took an entomology class and one of the critters I captured was a tarantula hawk. Tarantula Hawks are beautiful gigantic solitary wasps that hunt, kill, and drag big ass tarantulas to their lairs for nursery food. On a weekend field study I found one, got a net on it, which makes them really pissed. It was shocking to see a stinger that looked to be an inch long pumping through the wadded netting. Somehow I managed to not crap myself getting it into the kill jar.

Here is a picture of one I pulled off the web for scale. The wings are bright orange/red and the bodies are metallic midnight blue.




Later that afternoon I was in my tent pinning my specimens to temporary cardboard displays in order to let them "set" in the proper positions. I opened the plastic container that I put the ants bees and wasps I collected that day. My Tarantula Hawk was only slightly dead, and blasted out of the tupperware container when I opened it up, and continued to go ape shit in my tent. The only thing separating me from a cowardly retreat was the zippers on my tents mosquito netting. I did not get stung, but I ruined my tent tearing my way out. On the upside I aced the class but my classmates never let me live down my escape.

[XemaSab]

23. The time a wasp built a nest in the rafters in the kitchen

The day the babies hatched was one of the most harrowing days of my life. :o

[CTyankee]

25. dead moths in my hubby's underwear...

he stacks up underwear and never wears them. The new ones come in but the old ones don't go out. I finally put my foot down and marched them into the recycling...