Among Friends

[We rescue cats]

I was always petrified of spiders so running into a tarantula when I camped on the Amazon about killed me. But I've learned to let them be . . . but a friend had a massive Wolf Spider in her woodshed and I nearly fainted. Thank heaven it went in a different direction.

[Citrine1]

@Desertdi   The size of a dinner plate?  Oh my, I think I'd die right on the spot.  LOL

[Desert Lily]

@Kachina624  If you haven't come across any of those, you're lucky.

We lived in a brand new apartment while waiting for our house at the top of the mountain to be done when we moved to the desert west. The 1st week I opened the door (ground level), there was a rattle snake trying to get into the next door apartment! It was 6:30AM, too early for management. My child & I stayed home until management arrived & did a search. 

We went to the post office one day, & I saw something hopping around. I thought it was a dark tumbleweed. It was a huge tarantula! It was bigger than my dad's fist. I tried to scream, but I was so scared that nothing came out! I ran back into the car & left. That same post office was invaded by hundreds of scorpions after a monsoon & had to close for 2 days.

I saw scorpions every year, mostly in the hot weather. On occasion, maintenance would be called to kill one that was trying to get in the office building entrance. But, my neighbors & I would see them on the sidewalk, the block fence walls, etc. I NEVER let my dogs outside without me to watch for them.

Scorpions would try to get in the house whenever we had a decent rain or monsoon. They angle themselves sideways to slip in. I always sprayed my yard, lower outside stucco, the block fence, garage, & my roof with a perimeter strong bug killer, and I resprayed after every rain.

Over the 20+ years I lived there, I saw 3 scorpions come in my house during rains. I learned to sit up all night if that's when it rained. Once, my fur baby was wagging her tail & staring at something in the back hall during a rain ... it was a scorpion! I yelled Bug!! , scooped her up, & put her in my bedroom. I then sprayed & smashed the scorpion. And then cleaned it up carefully. 

It was the 3rd one I saw. I resealed my back door and put so much caulking, weather seal, etc. that it looked ugly. But, it kept those nasty scorpions out after that.

Both next door neighbors there got scorpions in their houses & garages several times per year, but they didn't spray & seal like I did. One of them had a huge mostly dead mesquite tree where scorpions lived that he let grow over his roof. His wife threatened to leave, so he finally had the tree removed.

I fear & hate tarantulas, snakes, & scorpions. Those & the heat made the desert not for me and were factors in my moving East.

[Travone]

@just bee 

@Kachina624 

I'm hoping the road runners in my neighborhood take care of these for me. 😁

[just bee]

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@Travone wrote:

@just bee 

@Kachina624 

I'm hoping the road runners in my neighborhood take care of these for me. 😁

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@Travone 

Aren't they fabulous? 

[Travone]

@just bee    I love them.  And I love that they don't run away when you go outside.  They look at you like what are you doing in my yard?

[haddon9]

Thank God, NO!!!  UGH!!

Just the thought of it gives me a shiver up my spine!

[just bee]

@Desert Lily 

We left Chicago for Prescott when I was ten years old.

It was an opportunity to meet -- up close -- every bug I'd ever seen in my set of World Book Encyclopedias.

Here in New Mexico we have our own unique set of critters.  Really large centipedes...

[just bee]

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@Travone wrote:

@just bee    I love them.  And I love that they don't run away when you go outside.  They look at you like what are you doing in my yard?

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@Travone 

Exactly!

What are you doing in their yard? 

All seriousness aside, I appreciate how bold they are.  And I love it when they stop and pose.

[haddon9]

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@Kachina624 wrote:

It happens annually in the desert, the tarantula migration.

I live in the desert and I've never seen s tarantula or a rattlesnake or a scorpion. 

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@Kachina624 Lucky you!  I would freak if I saw one of them!!  I have seen videos of a rattle snake under the kitchen sink of someone's home and they had to get a professional to remove it.

My mother lived in South Florida for 30 years and in all that time neither of us actually saw a gator in the wild!  Yet there are bodies of water (behind her condo) all over FL.