Here I was extolling the virtues of nature in my last entry, and yesterday, when I was outside - BAREFOOTED, Bill was blowing the leaves off of the patio and from under the trailer, and out crawls this... this... thing. It as huge (actually about 8 inches long)! It had huge pinchers and came at us like it meant business. EEK! I was up on the picnic bench like a stereotypical woman who's seen a mouse.After I got over the initial ICK! factor, I wanted to capture this creature. I had never see one before and as I read about it later, I found out they're very rare, which makes me sorry that we killed it. But we couldn't have that thing crawling into the trailer!
It is a Giant Redheaded Centipede. And if ever the saying, "everything's big in Texas" applied, this was it. At first, we only saw it's prey - a giant green caterpillar that was writhing in agony. When we discovered the centipede, it crawled right over and started sucking the guts out of it's paralyzed victim. This centipede has a nasty sting. If a human is bitten, the are would swell, but go away in about three hours, according to the man that let one bite him on the finger (idiot!). Another entry said it could be fatal, especially to kids. Either way, we played it safe and kept our distance. I only hope there were no babies!
BTW - I found a picture of the fox that I talked about in the last entry. Its a gray fox. Pretty! I'll stick with him.
