Best of the best: Insects

In the nearly two years I have been here in Honduras, I have done a lot of strange things in my free time.  But one of my favorite hobbies is something I have been working on for the entirety of my service. What I have here is a sampling of my collection of the creepy and/or disgusting insects that have graced my path during my service.

This post is dedicated to my former roommate who was obtaining her Masters in Entomology at UA when we lived together. Victoria: if you can identify any of these things for me, let me know. Congrats on your upcoming wedding btw (;

I hope all of you will enjoy viewing these just as much as I did.

SPIDERS:

A tarantula nearly the size of my lens cap. This guy was trying to scamper out of the shower at my host family’s house in El Real.

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This Golden Silk Spider (?) was spotted during a hike in Punta Sal rain forest preserve off the coast of Tela. I stayed pretty far away from this and had the camera is zoomed in as far as it would go. Which was, unfortunately, not nearly far enough.

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These guys were everywhere all the time. I tried googling it and my best guess is a Wolf Spider, or Brazilian Wolf Spider. The one above seems to only have 7 legs, and because of this oddity I was able to recognize him every time he showed up in my house.

I wasn’t scared of them until my friend Kristi told me she got bit by one while she was taking laundry off the line.

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And if you’re not careful, the spiders will lay eggs in your clothes while you’re not looking…

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BEETLES and things that look like Beetles:

Found this ugly guy in my bed at the host fam’s house

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Actually I think I’ve seen these things in my parents backyard in Ohio. But they don’t belong in my sink.

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I don’t even know.

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Whatever it is, it’s the size of a house key.

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ROACHES: 

Roaches are disgusting for obvious reasons, and most people have had too many encounters with them for mine to be noteworthy. However some are just too creepy to pass up…

A roach in my bath scrubby thing. Needless to say, I no longer use a bath scrubby thing.

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Huge hissing cockroach found in our pila in El Real. It didn’t move until…

…I flipped it over with my keys and it  made very loud, angry noises.

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So this is my favorite nature story. One day, I saw this particularly gross roach in the corner of my kitchen. Several hours later, it was still there. Which presented a bit of a problem because I would have to move it somehow and, well, gag me. However, later that day it was gone. But I soon found this behind a door…

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A big giant wolf spider had the VERY SAME ROACH in its MOUTH. Big win for team arachnid! Oh wait…

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OTHER UNIDENTIFIABLE/CREEPY/INTERESTING BUGS:

Finally something not hideous: A giant luna month (?), probably five inches in diameter.

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I only know this guy by the name that the host family uses and they call it an esperanza.

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Another slug-looking thing in my lettuce that I bought from the mercado. I was going to give it all to Bernice anyway…

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This scorpion was spotted by my friend as she was walking barefoot around the pool at the house we rented for SunJam on Utila. They were going to kill it but I wouldn’t let them until I took a picture.

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Finally, the one that  grossed me out the most:

Drum roll please….

The ant infestation in my bathroom in El Real.

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See those dark spots in the corners? Not dirt. Not water. ANTS. Lots and lots of ants.

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I woke up one morning and there were hundreds (thousands?) of them around the bathroom sink and all over the wall. I don’t know why they were there or what they were eating. But after I  threw up a little in my mouth, I sprayed them down with roach killer. Good news: it killed them all and they never came back. Bad news: I had hundreds (thousands?) of ant carcasses to clean up. Disgusting. I still get chills looking at it.

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Though I am very disheartened and emotional about leaving Honduras in two weeks, there are some things I will not miss. Actually there are about 10 million things I will not miss.