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This week is Shark Week on The Discovery Channel. It’s not only Shark Week, but it’s the 25th anniversary of Shark Week, which means that for the last 25 years the kind and wonderful people at The Discovery Channel have been scaring little children (and big chickens like me) and keeping them from enjoying the beautiful beaches of this world.
Yes, you read that right — I’m a chicken and I’m afraid of sharks. Worse, I live in Florida, the state with the most shark sightings.
I’m also afraid of snakes. Did you see the story that broke this week about the record-breaking Burmese Python? They killed it this week in the Florida Everglades. It’s seventeen feet and seven inches long. Yes, that’s right SEVENTEEN FEET AND SEVEN INCHES LONG. A record. Another record is that it had 87 eggs in it.
Yup, pythons live in Florida with me, too.
Lovely.
Have I mentioned spiders? Spiders make me scream. I once caught my house on fire trying to get rid of one. Yes, I hate them THAT badly. And here I am, in Florida where two of the most deadly spiders live.
I was going to put a picture of a spider here, but I was afraid it might attract real ones, so I’m just going to put a picture of this, instead:
There. I feel better.
And then there are the giant iguanas . . . seriously, we have them. They lurk in trees and then, when the temperatures get a bit chilly, fall into a stupor and tumble out of trees right onto unsuspecting people’s heads.
And don’t even get me started on Killer Bees or Gators. No, no, NO.
What wild critters live near your house and make you cringe? Have you had any encounters with those critters? Are you watching Shark Week? And if so, why?
69 Comments on “Ugly critters in my own back yard …”
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You really don’t want to live here in Australia, we have several of the deadliest snakes, spiders that kill people if they don’t seek help quickly. There’s blue ringed octopi, stone fish, salt water crocodiles and other animal that can kill you but we do have such beauty too. I try to avoid the things that can kill me as much as possible.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 6:10 am.
Kelly, I saw a TV show about spiders and one came from your neck of the woods. It had big fangs and could bite through leather.
I didn’t sleep a wink that night.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:13 am.
I saw that show too Karen. Nightmares!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 10:49 am.
I live in Florida and for the life of me can’t figure out why they would put up a park for alligators. Yes, alligators when you can see them for free practically anywhere. Why pay good money to see them up close and personal? I don’t want to see them up close and personal. This is the one thing that does freak me out.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 6:26 am.
Aida, I know! I’ve never understood that, either. I see them all of the time, especially floating in Lake Jessup.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:20 am.
Hmmm…when you put it all together like that….shudder…That’s a lot of critters.
We have copperhead snakes here. We’ve seen a few. Ugh. I hate snakes.
But right now we are fighting The Great Garbage War with possums. We thought we had won, until they decided to chew through the garbage cans. Now, how to you fight that?
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 6:41 am.
Heck yes, possums can be trouble. One once attacked my golden retriever. That was so sad and Beau came away with 26 bites and a nose swollen to twice what it should have been. My poor dog spent a week at the vet’s.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:23 am.
Youngest son is watching shark week. He told me about it. That was scary enough. No thanks.
Mice freak me out. HATE them. If we catch one in the house, I lock myself in the office until it’s out of the house.
We also have foxes, raccoons, possums and a few coyote. They do not scare me like those mice.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 7:07 am.
Lori, mice are bad and rats are worse. We had fruit rats in our attic when we first moved into our house *shudder* … Needless to say, we had them removed, forcibly.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:29 am.
I don’t like snakes which explains why my boys would take me to see the snakes at the zoo first. I don’t mind mice unless they are dead. Don’t ask me why. My grandson had pet mice and pet rats. I was the cool grandmother who would pick them up and talk to them. My parents use to live in a mobile park in FL. There was a pond there. It was home to an alligator. There was no fence around the pond.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 7:12 am.
Sandi, when I first moved to Florida, I couldn’t believe there were so many alligators, even in the city. I was shocked and kept my then-morsel-sized kids away from all water. Sheesh!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:36 am.
You’ve seen Jersey Shore, Mob Wives and Real Housewives/NJ? Those are the critters that live near me and make me cringe.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 7:17 am.
Haha! Too funny!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:15 am.
Lol! Those count, too.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:36 am.
lol I feel your pain. To get rid of them, just throw a cubic zirconia bracelet and what them run.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 11:47 am.
BWAA!!!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 2:54 pm.
last week my niece posted on facebook that she killed a spider with oven cleaner while her parents were away. her mom’s mobile response? “we have oven cleaner?”
they REALLY hate spiders.
my sis Debbie had a horrible experience with a spider egg sack. she walked into it while hanging laundry on the line. the baby spiders burst out and swarmed all over her. she ran through the house stripping her clothes off and scream the entire way to the shower, surprising her then young children and their friends. she said she saw all the little spiders flowing down the drain. She already hated spiders. this just cemented the whole deal.
In my neighbourhood, there is a raccoon, yappy squirrels and at the park across the street, 8 vicious geese who hiss and bite- though it is hilarious to watch traffic come to a stand still when they all cross the street (at the crosswalk)to get the next patch of grass!
There is also a young husky dog who howls along with passing sirens.
my scary critter days are behind me. Trinidad was full of those giant hissing cockroaches, tarantulas occasionally falling in the pool, and iguanas in the trees. shudder!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 7:23 am.
Kathy, lol! I think my response would have been the same.
I have to say that now I never want to go to Trinidad. Ever. Hissing cockroaches? No, thank you.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:40 am.
We are currently living in Malawi. The critter near me include baboon spiders which are basically tarantulas about the size of my hand. Huge lizards, the guards reports yesterday they had spotted “a crocodile that climbs trees” in our yard. Ummmm….yeah. Turns out it was a 3 foot monitor lizard, not really sure that is much better. But the critters that live around here that totally terrorize me are mambas, cobras and boomslangs, oh my. I haven’t seen any of the deadly snakes yet and really hope I never do.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:22 am.
Ok, Shannon, mambas and cobras are in an entirely different realm of scary. And baboon spiders – ewwwwww! That made me shudder.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:49 am.
I fear all of nature to about the same degree. I do admit to a special loathing of rats. Which is why I like snakes. Python! Get the rat! Good snake. Good, good boy.
I think nature is potentially dangerous, always. Swim with dolphins? Are you insane? Dolphins have been “caught” trying to RAPE people. Now there’s a pretty image.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:22 am.
Claudia, dolphins are NOT cuddly fish, as so many people think. While I admire their intelligence and playfulness, I also respect that they are a wild animal.
Btw, you’re right about snakes … Garter snakes, but not 17 feet long pythons. Those eat people.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 9:15 am.
I think the question should be what critters don’t you have? Thankfully we don’t have two hundred and eight foot long pythons, but we do have copperheads, and various other snakes that may or may not be poisonous, but hello, they are snakes! They all freak me out. Since you are bringing on nightmares lets talk about spiders. We have black widows and brown recluses here. (Which make me want to become a recluse myself!) Let’s see, a skink(lizard-non toxic) got into the house last week which provided some great entertainment and screams. Luckily my brain is just a wee bit bigger than his and I outsmarted him.
I could go on and on with a huge dead fly I found in the yard, or the creepy medieval steroid filled bug crawling up the screen the other night, but I won’t. Do I watch shark week? No. I think I did once. How could the other 24 years be very different? Lol. I need to thank you now because I haven’t got nearly enough done this week. Today’s blog ought to keep me from getting any sleep for the rest of the week, so I should get caught up on plenty of things! Oh, and I do have one of those electrified tennis rackets(above pic), and I get way too much enjoyment out of it!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:29 am.
Kelly, yeah, Florida is sort of the ‘come pester us state,’ isn’t it?
I’m sorry if I caused you to lose sleep. Just focus on the picture of the electric spider swatter. I found that very comforting.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 10:15 am.
I can’t allow myself to watch any animal documentary shows. I invariably end in tears when the helpless little creature they’ve made me fall in love with is eaten. Nature kills!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:57 am.
Susan, I KNOW! I was watching the NatGeo channel the other day and they showed the cutest little bunny – I was charmed until a huge snake ate it. I still have nightmares.
Nature can be brutal, can’t it?
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 10:17 am.
It’s unnatural!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 2:38 pm.
I am glad that I already made my trip to Florida this year because after reading this post, I might have changed my mind.
We don’t have pythons or gators or sharks, which is a good thing because I am not sure I could live here if we did. I am such a wimp when if comes to reptiles and critters. I won’t swim in lakes, rivers or oceans because of the unknown. The thought of what could possibly get me down there… yikes.
We have spiders and garden snakes, none of them deadly, that I know of. I can sometimes hear coyotes howling in the distance, but they don’t bother me, as long as they stay in the distance. There was a black bear sitting around her last summer, but nothing ever came of it, and I have never came across one. **knock on wood**
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 9:05 am.
Amy, fortunately most of Florida’s dangerous animals seem to be in the water so they’re pretty easy to avoid. I do wish they’d explain to tourists that most bodies of water, even little ones like retention ponds in the middle of cities, and ditches along the side of the road, can have gators living in them and that small pets and children are especially at risk. But no, that doesn’t fit our lovely ‘sunshine state’ image, so …
We also have bears, but they’re very small compared to what I saw in TN and in other states. They’re also usually very shy.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 10:37 am.
I have friends who keep encouraging me to move south. I keep telling them that things slither year round when you get south of the mason dixon line and I need at least a 6 month respite from my paranoia that this provides.
*shuddah*
I am soooo with you on all of this.
We do have rattlesnakes, copperheads, bears etc but they all steer clear of humans. Pythons seem to keep being found in areas that they should be avoiding.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 9:12 am.
Pesky, it’s not so bad when you’re not in a sub-tropic area, so the Mason-Dixon line isn’t the real demarcation, but I see your point.
The pythons arrived because of exotic pet owners who buy them and then one day think, “OH MY GOSH, IT COULD EAT ME!” and so they take them to the everglades and let them loose. Local scientists say that there are so many pythons now that small rodent and bird populations are being affected. That’s scary. Hopefully, they’ll open a hunting season on them and keep them in check. They have very few predators and even eat gators. Yes, gators. Ugh.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 11:34 am.
Being from Montana and there right now, I have a healthy fear of rattlesnakes, grizzly bears, and hitting a deer in the car (I’ve seen them total cars!). When I’m in California I still worry about rattlesnakes because they have been spotted in our neighborhood. Of course, there are the sharks. I think about them every time we’re at the beach. Just days ago a great white was spotted at Venice Beach, which isn’t close to my house, but just knowing there’s one in the Santa Monica Bay, is enough to keep me out of the water.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 9:32 am.
Oh, Janae, yes. I’ve hit a deer with a car and it totaled it. And yes, it scared the bejeebers out of me. I felt really bad for the poor deer, too. It had no idea what was going on.
And like you, I usually avoid going into the ocean, but when I do I stay in the shallow water. Chicken, thy name is Karen.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 11:38 am.
Oh man….watching shark week would fall in the same category of going to a slasher film for me (as in–not going to happen!). We don’t have the massive creepy-crawlies like you do–we have rodents. Big ones (IIIICCCCCKKKKK!).
Of course, there’s always your standard farm mice, which become a huge menace in the fall–we harvest the fields where they resided all summer–they then enter our houses. We spend at least a month battling for dominance of the homestead. Beyond mice….
Opossums (has anyone seen the Geiko commercial? That’s an accurate portrayal of what happens)
Racoons (HUGE pests)
Bats (rats with wings)
Skunks (plenty of bad experiences with this one)
Also your run of the mill: Ground Squirrels, Badgers, Beavers, and the occasional Woodchuck
I think would would also include deer in the category of local pest…largely over-populated rats on stilts
Good luck staying away from all things slimy!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 9:36 am.
Mice can just take over a house quickly, can’t they? And they can get through such tiny little cracks.
Racoons are not the nicest of animals. They look sort of cute in pictures, but they can really be mean! Especially a mama who thinks you are getting too close to her babies.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 12:58 pm.
DH is a beekeeper so we have all been desensitized to bugs. Mice are much the same – they don’t eat much. Although they are not welcome in the house and will be trapped and eliminated.
Ohio has big Black Rat snakes (up to 6′) that are nonvenomous but will startle you when you find one up in a tree. Coyotes are here too – cats and small dogs have been known to disappear!
Good luck with the scary things in Florida! Ugh..
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 9:44 am.
Black Rat snake just sounds like something “not good”.
Beekeeping has always fascinated me. I don’t know if I could actually DO it, but I like that others can.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 1:06 pm.
I live in BC, Canada, and as far as I know there aren’t any deadly spiders around my home… but that doesn’t stop me from being terrified of them. I’m sure that one could find a poisonous spider the further away from the major cities you go, but thankfully I live in a city, rural though it may be. But if I so much as find a spiderweb in my garage… *shudders* I won’t go in there until my husband has found the sucker and gotten rid of it.
I see lots of racoons, crows, pigeons, seagulls and squirrels. Squirrels don’t bother me, but the other three do. I’m not frightened of the birds, but they’re super aggressive when you’ve got food that they want. Go to a beach and see if your food doesn’t get stolen from your hands. I’ve seen it happen, folks.
Wild mice and rats bother me. My mom lives by Burns Bog and there are lots of wild rodents around there. When I lived there as a kid we were invaded by mice… it was terrifying. I could hear them scuttering around in my closet as I slept at night… or rather DIDN’T sleep at night.
I also hate mosquitos. I am terrified of needles, and to me they’re like little miniature needles penetrating my skin. They seriously bother me.
Ok, I’m getting the heeby jeebies now. I’m off to think of something happy.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 10:24 am.
That sound of the mice scurrying around at night is rather terrifying, isn’t it? Imaginations start to run wild about what all they are doing back there. *shudder*
And thanks for the thought of mosquitoes being like little needles. Didn’t need that.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 1:09 pm.
Haha! Sorry about the needles…
I know! As I heard them scurrying, I worried what they were walking on and what they were pooping on and what I was going to find in the morning. I also worried that they’d get bold and walk on me while I slept. *shudders* ugh that’s a horrible thought!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 2:45 pm.
Exactly. They can be very unsettling!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 8:42 pm.
My name is Julie and I am a chicken.
I live in Texas where there are a number of creepy crawlies that either scare me, creep me out, or are just gross. Scorpions, spiders, snakes, coyotes, fire ants, possums, raccoons, bees, red wasps, june bugs… Thankfully, we don’t come into contact with too many since we live in a subdivision, but we do have the ants, spiders and scorpions, which I HATE. I know hate is a strong word, but it is entirely applicable in this case. I’m very sensitive when I get stung by things–I swell up like a balloon, so I try to stay far away from the the things that sting. Yuck!
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 10:29 am.
I think “hate” is appropriate in this context. Texas does have its share of icky things, doesn’t it? I think the water moccasins need to be added to that list as well. Nasty creatures.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 1:11 pm.
Spiders are the worst – hint – if you scream at a high enough pitch the spiders do turn and run the other way – and always have extrahold hair spray available to ‘freeze’ those monsters in their place. I am so bad with spiders I cannot watch a tv show and see one or I freak out. I also do not go into the ocean because it is loaded with creepy crawly spiderish things – crabs for instance.
I dont mind snakes – they are not slimey and actually feel real nice to the touch…now I wouldn’t be going out grabbing a rattler but I am not going to douse it with hairspray either.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 10:36 am.
Good to know about the high pitched scream. Exactly how high does it need to be, I’d be up for voice lessons to expand my screaming range if need be.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 1:12 pm.
I can handle things like spiders if they are not too big. What amazes me is people like you who live in a place that has critters that eat people! No, thanks. I am sure you sort of get used to keeping your eyes open for critters, but I don’t think I would ever get used to it.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 10:50 am.
I am with you, people eating critters are BAD.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 1:13 pm.
The worst critters around here (western Oregon) are raccoons (annoying and aggressive jerks, who think nothing of ambling through pet doors) and the occasional coyote. Salmon don’t fall into the bad critter category, but they ARE delicious.
Snakes cause adrenalin to be released into every cell of my body.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 11:05 am.
I think having a raccoon come through my pet door would startle me to no end. Then I’d have to figure out how to get them out! I think that would be a Hot Cop job.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 1:15 pm.
I live in Northern California where there is a town named after sharks, Sausalito, I may watch Shark Week but I don’t get in ocean or bay waters beyond my lower legs which are very short. Spiders aren’t so bad they eat bugs which terrify me. I have been in the south and must say the cockroaches are HUGE and fly. As for gators I wouldn’t have minded seeing one in the wild safely in my car and was disappointed that I never did see one.
I garden and my biggest fear is that my tomatoes will get Tomato Horn Worm, they are huge and gross and if they ever appeared in my garden I would rip it out and burn it. No exceptions.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 11:19 am.
Those tomato horn worms look more like aliens to me than worms. I definitely don’t want them in any garden I might plant.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 1:19 pm.
I can deal with mice and snakes (I mean, not that I hunt them out.. or want them as pets…) but spiders? Hellz to the NO.
In my area, we have black widows, brown recluse, and all sorts of other nasty 8 legged beings. We also have mountain lions and coyotes one type of which got my dad’s dog and my dog about 12 years ago.. so I am not very fond of them.
In my travels, I have run into many more rather scary thing, but find I am not as scared of them as I am spiders.. now, the spiders I saw in the Amazon? I think I’ll take the black widows and smaller ones here.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 11:31 am.
Amazonian spiders are not to be trifled with. Aren’t they the size of Buicks there?
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 1:26 pm.
I hate spiders. I’ve seen more webs around my yard this summer than any other. BIG webs. No spiders. I can only imagine what size it is to make that size web. We keep knocking it down and it keeps coming back. We also have stink bugs. These things like to spend the winter and hibernate in your attic. They don’t do anything, however if you squish them, your hand will smell for days. And I mean smell BAD. I’ve also had some run ins with a black bear. Not fun.
It could be worse. If you live in South Africa, they’ve discover jumping cockroaches. They call them Leaproach.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 11:39 am.
Jumping cockroaches?! *shudder* Those sound as bad as the big flying ones in the south.
No. thank. you.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 1:27 pm.
I don’t mind spiders except when I walk through their web on my way to my car in the morning.
Bats. I find bats fascinating to watch when they are not in my house. One of the many disadvantages of living in a historical neighborhood.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 12:12 pm.
I hate walking through webs. I have the heebyjeebies for the rest of the day when it happens.
Bats are interesting, but you are right – not so much inside the house.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 3:36 pm.
Won’t be watching Shark Week unless there’s no baseball one of those nights. We have the recluse spider, although I discovered they’re not native to NJ, and the Black Widow. In some parts of the state we have copperheads and rattlesnakes. Some of the worst offenders are deer ticks and bed bugs. Mosquitoes bother my daughters at their house but don’t seem to hang out where I live. Of all the above, I hate mosquitoes most of all, but wouldn’t want to encounter any of the others head-on.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 12:33 pm.
Mosquitoes are definitely pests, though they don’t particularly frighten me.
I am always paranoid of bed bugs now. Not necessarily for the bugs themselves, but all the work it takes to get rid of them.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 3:37 pm.
You do have some scary stuff down in Florida. I wondered why they killed the Python though? Was it bothering someone or in a place it shouldn’t have been? The good thing about being in FL with the gators is that you have Gator Boys and Paul Bedard :yum: :p Gator Boys has become my guilty pleasure this summer :blush: I am not a fan of spiders. Ick.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 1:05 pm.
I haven’t watched the Gator Boys, I might have to add it to the list of “Shows to Watch When I am Done With Deadline Dementia”.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 5:10 pm.
Yay, Shark Week! RWA usually falls during Shark Week, so Karen & I watch it together.
I don’t know why I love watching it — something to do with seeing something I’m really afraid of and knowing I haven’t been eaten by it, maybe. My brain knows I’m pretty safe and how we’re really not shark prey, and all the ways to avoid being attacked. My body knows the minute I step into the ocean 12 giant maneaters are going to swarm me. *g*
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 1:42 pm.
It is sad our Shark Week watching was not meant to be this year.
I am with you. While I know logically it won’t happen, I am pretty sure a giant mutant spider is plotting revenge against me for all its brethren I have disposed of.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 5:15 pm.
I live in Central California. We have coyotes and mountain lions (we live near a river with a forested greenbelt), so small pets disappear. Skunks that forage in our compost bin in the backyard. And I won’t go camping anywhere around here because of BEARS. And then there are the black widow spiders. In my garage. SHUDDER.
And I LOVE Shark Week. or did back in my old, pre-child days when I had cable TV and time to watch it.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 3:19 pm.
Black widows have no place in garages. I don’t know why they cannot get that through their scary little heads.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 5:17 pm.
Always watch Shark Week. JAWS scared me so much I will never swim in anything other than a pool from now on.
Snakes are no big deal for us. Have been catching them since I was a kid. Do have spiders and have learned to deal with them. They were so large in the Philippines (I was there 3 years) they were just too big to squish. We had a truce and I was VERY thankful for the mosquito netting. Rolled over one morning and had one the size of my palm on the wall right in front of my face.
The only thing that concerns us here in TN are the bears. The mountains next to us are a bear preserve. Our son was attacked in our back yard.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 11:24 pm.
Well, since I live in Orlando, I have all of the above, plus in my yard (and in the pool occasionally) I have frogs, lizards and snakes. I have fished out about 3 or 4 baby snakes out of the pool, all still alive, a few live lizards, and lots of dead frogs. Don’t get me started on those crazy squirrels that love to run up and across my screened pool enclosure, bouncing all the way. Oh, and the big wolf spiders and palmetto bugs that somehow get in the house, ewwww. I even found a pond turtle in my driveway the other day, I’m not sure how he got there since the lake is about a block away, but I carried him back home and made sure he got safely back in the water.
Posted on August 15, 2012 at 11:31 pm.
No, I’m not watching Shark Week.
We have skunks. I smelled one the other night at 3 AM.
There are also Hobo Spiders around.
Posted on August 16, 2012 at 12:24 am.
But in Orlando you have those creepy “love bugs”, bugs flying around attached at their posteriors. Unless you can come up with a really good plot line out that, those are gross.
We have critters sometimes, but there lots of times I love living in deep dark suburbia, they only happen once in awhile.
Posted on August 16, 2012 at 2:35 am.