Coffee Break: Odd News, Helpful Info and Laughs for 2009

hahahha my daughter would be collecting them, the girls in my family like these things can you imagine we went to disney last may my 10 year old had four lizards in a bug cage by the end of the first day the boys at the complex where we stayed were jealous lol us canadians have no fear of bugs lol we have bears, wolf, and husbands hahahha

you travel with a bug cage???

oh and the complex they have a baby resident gator and the girls 9 and 10 hand fed that thing all week it was only 2 feet long but I insisted they use a bbq fork to feed it the manager at the complex said it was ok since it was being pick up by the wild life guys at the end of the week for relocation the boy would not do it, but my girls thought it was great also wanted to take home a turtle bigger than my dog

actually it is part of my daughters bug kit lol she says she wants to be a bugologist hahah
some day I will correct that to entomologist but for now its funny to hear her say that

that's very cool then!

its better than having them scream every time they see something like a bug lol
I raised the girls outside as much as possible taking them for nature walks from a very young age they also love going to the east coast to explore seaside tidal pools and such
at home we go walking in the woods last fall we watched a family of foxes it was great and we look for rabbits and deer and make list of birds we see that is why digital cameras made it to the top of the xmas list this year to me it is important for the girls to be comfortable nature and in the garden

That sounds great. I grow up running the woods around here. Creepy crawlies do not bother me either but I have a healthy respect for the snakes and gators and bad bugs. We have 7 types of venomous and 3 kinds of black widow spiders. And Do Not Let you girls feed the gators!!!!!!

since it was a vacation thing its not something that is going to happen again it only the grounds manager was doing it I asked him why he was doing it and he said its because the little guy got trapped inside the enclosure and with nothing to eat he felt sorry for the litlle guy and had called to get him removed it was a temporary thing all around

I did have the conversation with the girls of never feeding wild animals that same day

That is very good. Most attacks are from gators that have been feed. And have them learn to know the snakes. The Pine snake is hard to find and is a rear fanged snake so it is no problem and the coral snake is also hard to find and and is slow to bite . The Timber rattler canbrake rattler and the copperhead are usually only found in West Florida.The Pygmy rattler, Diamondback rattler and the Cotton mouth moccasin are the more common ones to watch out for.

We have the Black widow and the Brown widow for sure. I have not seen the Red widow or the Brown reclusive spiders but they are reported to be in Florida.

Phuggins I agree about the size of our bugs. We have Skeeters so big that one Dec. on a bird count we kept mistaking ones we saw out of the corners of our eyes as birds, my birding partner said that they had landing gears and gun sights. I was dressed for the cold-which did not happen that day, the year before I froze-I had 2 pair of socks, therm underwear, hose, a heavy pair of pants all tucked into my Snake boots(6 layers of tough leather) and I found a mosquito bite 2 inches below the top of the Snake boots. LOL

I had a coral snake almost run over my hand in Hollywood.

The coral is a very calm, snake and very rarely bite and they are usually so small that it is hard for them to bite a person. The Pygmy and the Moccasins are bad tempered so they have to be watched out for. The diamond back rattler will bite but they do not always inject venom. If you are bite and it only burns a little they you will be ok but if it burns like a cigarette was ground into you skin that you get a full load. They will usually try to keep away from you . When you are in the woods and stomp you feet every once in a well you will not see any snakes.

Reguardless - I dont like them or spiders.

All that venom/bite info is why I live in Maine. ^_^

But you have bears

Far a few between where I live, up North more is a differnt story.

Neighbor goes up the road from me and sits in the car with a freind and has a few pops. The are seeing "something" he said a black wolf or wolverine. They have been baiting it for about a week.

this part summer we had lots of rain and the snakes used my driveway being black asphalt to sun themselves the girls go use to walking right by them some as long as over four feet and we do have recluse spiders show a few to them so they know not to touch them since the bite is much bigger than the spider lol we do have one kind of rattler its small but every year some silly person get bitter walking in fields with sandles or usually by stepping on it they get you real sick but no deaths that I ve heard of

my way we have to be carefull with wolves in the winter and cayotes but they are pretty shy and dont usually come close but last winter with 14 feet of snow they got bold from hunger

black wolf is rare are they not mostly gray

I can only tell you what he told me. They go at night and bait it with meat.

we also have fishers they are brave and nasty will go after a cat on a door step in the middle of the day even with humans around a friend down the road from me lost her cat last fall way back in the fifties some smart government person thought it was the best way to deal with skunks and imported fishers well now the skunks are gone and the fishers also took care of the rabbits and all small animal in the area

don't you just love so called smart government persons who heads are full of rocks!!!!!!

Full of rocks or plum empty

they should know better than to import animals or bugs to take care of problems since in the end it is always worse to deal with the solution than the original problem lol

We-eelll... All of you have cured me of southern climate envy! This year, more than ever, I was contemplating a permanent move south, and ya had me til the spiders! The poisonous snakes (in the garden?) was the deal breaker. I'll stick with the bears and the snow!

I was in florida last may for 10 days it was amazing what scared the !!!! out of me was seeing a shark at daytona beach it was a very hot day and the girls begged me to so in the water and I said no you can walk with me at the edge but no swimming man I was glad on that choice since about ten minutes later I saw a fin and it freaked me out since people had kids in the water I spoke to one of the mothers and she was fine with it lol
not me I do not like sharks

Whaddya mean she was FINE WITH IT???!!!!

Was the beach closed? If it was then it was a shark. If the beach was not posted and closed it could of been a porpoise (sp) or a dolphin. I saw a black fin in Fort Myers and thought it was a shark - it was 2 dolphins playing.

Poison snakes are not common and are rare in areas that have been clean cut with is one of the horrible things builders do around here. Shark bites are rare and it is usually when the water is cloudy and the shark can not see you. It seems that sharks do not usually like the taste of people.
We have had brown widows all around our house for many, many years , even in our mail box and not one of us including the postperson have every been bitten. With the snakes or spiders the people who are bitten are trying to kill them and they bite in self defense so if you leave them alone they will not bite!!!!! You are more likely to be hurt in a car accident, than be bitten by a shark, snake or spider. Specially with all the crazy northern drivers down here!!!!LOL

Sandy

Those palmetto bugs are definitely gross. I was in Key West one time - as a hurricane was moving in. As we went for a walk, we looked down one street and it was a river of palmetto bugs. Freaked me out!

That would of freaked me out too. One is bad enough.

I was sleeping and one flew up my body and got caught in my hair and was buzzing and flapping.

I flew.

Yuck!

Me too, I woke up one night and one was crawling in my hair. My shriek apparently could be heard all the way to the Mason-Dixon line. A few days later I went into the kitchen and one of the little b******* was hanging out in the toaster. I could just see his two antennae waving, waving back and forth...

UGH! I would have tossed the toaster! The only thing that scared me in FL was the F3 tornado that hit the Villages at 3:10 am on Groundhog Day--it missed us by a few miles---I don't think we would have survived---the damage was incredible, & so many deaths, I cried for days for the children. I couldn't go to see the damage until the week we went back to CT---my stepson & his wife were visiting us, & they pursuaded us to go.

Oh - that's gross, Pam. That must have been real scary, Robin.

wren - i saw a show on the discovery channel and the guy caught a HUGE king cobra in FL. - it was maybe 8-10' long. i knew about the pythons and other constrictors that have been let loose - first i had heard about cobra's.

i'll be careful next time i'm golfing down their for sure!

If you have roaches in the south and cant get rid of them without a professional tent $$$ and you tossed everything they got on or into. Your house would be empty.

as for the shark that is what it was and it was only a few minutes before the life guard had every one out of the water, he said it was not very big and about 30 feet out man I do not like them big or small lol

the cobra had escaped for a reptile shop.

really - on the program it did not mention that - some guy in a trailer saw it and told the snake guy about it. they did not believe the description given, claiming everyone exaggerates - they ended up pulling it out of some construction rubble. it had been there a long time - the snake guy figured out before hand it was probably a cobra by the snake skin they found near by.

i'm packing a head wrap and flute in my golf bag just in case.