In Michigan, where I live, we don't have the same species of fire ants the south does, but we do have red and black ants that sting, since we had a nest of them in our backyard when growing up. So, technically, we do not have "southern fire ants" in Michigan, but we do have ants that sting and bite, but they are not common.
I have never seen those stinging ants in Michigan since.
I'm from Michigan as well...I never have a problem with ants other than the occasional one of the black carpenter ants or the very tiny red ants. For me, if I get a fire going and setup my sleeping area, by the time I am ready to use it, they have all scurried off. If they don't, a little smoke in the ground area usually drives them off for the night, such as an ashed out log placed on some clear ground near my sleeping bag for a few minutes.
I can agree heartily MNS.. 20 below has it's drawbacks, but it does take care of the more obnoxious varieties of creepy crawlies....
(how I can condition myself to tolerate sky darkening mosquitos, but freak out over the thought of fire ants or worse.. tarantulas.. is beyond me but I guess I'm just a northern boy <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />
Seriously? There's not a more docile critter out there. A few years ago in Big Bend (the place where you want to go, phat), there was a bumper crop of tarantulas. They were migrating in a steady march to the north....weird. One crawled right over my foot while I was having dinner. Oblivious to me but fun to watch. Basically harmless furry spiders. We have them here...very common.
Seriously? There's not a more docile critter out there. A few years ago in Big Bend (the place where you want to go, phat), there was a bumper crop of tarantulas. They were migrating in a steady march to the north....weird. One crawled right over my foot while I was having dinner. Oblivious to me but fun to watch. Basically harmless furry spiders. We have them here...very common.
I am seriously arachnophobic. I know they're docile. I know they're harmless.. but that's the rational side of me.. The stupid idiotic irrational phobic side still knows they're furry and have 8 eyes and fangs that drip sulphuric acid... so it's only my irrational side that screams like a little girl when I see one <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />
Phat, Boy, do i have a video for you! I was in the Three Sisters last week and looked up from my book...and there was a bug stuck to the mesh of my tent, not 6 inches from my face, that was BIGGER THAN MY HAND! I tried to wake my daughter, but thought better of it. If she saw that monster she would have immediately packed up and left. It looked as though it could have easily bitten through the mesh and torn me apart. My dog started whimpering at the site of this giant. No kidding. I grabbed my camera, turned it on video and got about 2 minutes of it. Six legs, yellow-green body, small head and a huge stinger on it's butt! I'll burn you a copy. I still have not figured out what it was...maybe some pre-historic bug? An escaped military science project?
Registered: 03/17/07
Posts: 374
Loc: Fredericksburg, VA
Furry spiders? Furry spiders? Seriously, that does not make them cute and adorable. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" /> Uggh! Next you're going to tell us that Praying Mantises and Walking Sticks aren't evil little freaks of nature preparing to attack us in our sleep. You'll probably say they are really sweet and like to discuss philosophy. Okay, I'm a little (a lot) freaked out by Praying Mantises and Walking Sticks. However, I think tarantulas would join the list were I to run into one on the trail . . .
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Why am I online instead of hiking?
- aint got it yet. 6 legged critters don't bother me much though - they're not a spider. remember I said I'm *arachnophobic* - don't ask me why it matters. remember I said "irrational" <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />
Oh, and lobsters and crabs and the like don't count either - they're too tasty to be spiders...
Oh, and I should have a positive ID for you soon - forwarded to one of my entymologist friends here (one of the authors of "bugs of washington and oregon").
Ah, one of THOSE bugs. Those things can silently and painlessly burrow into your skin, lay eggs, and be gone before you wake up. Thank goodness for bug nets, except that for every one you see, there are 10 you didn't see (or feel). Burrow bugs can project an image of themselves and make it seem like they are on the other side of the netting. Very crafty constructs of evolution.
Bigfoot, are you by chance suffering from stock market fear or other irrational feelings?*
*rational to you, ask someone else of you seem irrational...like your wife.
I contacted an entymologist friend here (an author of "Bugs of Oregon and Washington") who says:
> Hi Bob, > > It's some sort of katydid-type grasshopper. I'll cc this to Dan Johnson > in Lethbridge, in the hopes that he might recognize the species. Eerie > movie! > > John
If I hear of the species I'll let you know <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />
>> I'm guessing that it is one of three choices: >> >> the long-legged bush cricket, Anabrus longipes (which is found in >> northern Oregon, at least, and probably also Three Sisters); >> >> the Blair Witch Bug (based on your video); >> >> or proof that aliens bred with grasshoppers in the late Devonian (the >> only evidence being the appearance and the subject heading). >> I feel 99% sure about choice #1, until more evidence for the other >> choices is found. >> >> I am reserving the 1% unless I have the species wrong altogether.
It looks like they're pretty nocturnal - which is why you probably don't normally see them (other than crawling on your tent at night <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> )
But it makes you think about what was that thing you thought was a mouse that you shoooed off the foot of your sleeping bag when you're tarping it don't it <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />
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