Who needs ghosts and ghouls when the horrors of nature abound? This month each week I’m going to highlight some of the scarier flora and fauna lurking outside our doors.
Or somebody else’s door, if you’re lucky.
A few days ago a friend posted on Instagram that he had killed a Tarantula Hawk Wasp. That friend would normally not go out of his way to kill a living creature, but after learning more I can totally understand why he reacted that way upon finding it at his doorstep.
As somebody who appreciates the the beauty that can be found in even in the strangest of the world’s living creatures, this fellow doesn’t look too bad - a bit sinister, but that’s the fate of many insects. We humans have a tendency to project our fears on the natural world, often totally unfounded.
Photo by Ken Bosma
Okay. So these insects are perfectly happy hanging out on sharp spiny cacti. They’re a bit scary looking, but then lots of insects are.
Did I mention that they’re really big? Up to 2.5 inches long? I’ll wait while you go get a ruler and check that out, so you can really visualize the size of them. My ring finger is right around 2.5 inches long. Some hummingbirds aren’t much bigger than that - here’s a Tarantula Hawk Wasp flying next to a hummingbird for scale.
You may have surmised by now, based on the name and their size that they prey on tarantulas. This is indeed the case, and if you’re a tarantula that’s unlucky enough to be caught by a female Tarantula hawk too bad for you.
An adult female will paralyze a tarantula with its stinger, and then transport the spider back to the hawk's nest. Once there, the female lays an egg in the spider's abdomen, then covers the entrance of the burrow to trap the spider.
Once the egg hatches, the larvae will feed on the still living spider for several weeks, avoiding vital organs to keep the spider alive until the larvae pupates into an adult wasp.
Ewww.
Male tarantula hawks are no trouble at all. They just go about their business sipping nectar, and never bother anybody. They don’t have stingers at all, so they’re not going to be any bother to humans.
It’s the females you need to watch out for! They aren’t interested in aggressively stinging people, but will do so if disturbed.
Still have your ruler out?
The females have a stinger that is a 1/4 inch long! Their sting is known to be the most painful of any insect in North America, and second in the world behind the Bullet Ant.
One researcher described the tarantula hawk’s sting this way: "To me, the pain is like an electric wand that hits you, inducing an immediate, excruciating pain that simply shuts down one’s ability to do anything, except, perhaps, scream. Mental discipline simply does not work in these situations. The pain for me lasted only about three minutes, during which time the sting area was insensitive to touch, i.e., a pencil point poked near the sting resulted only in a dull deep pressure pain."
The good news is the sting won’t kill you, though you may wish yourself dead for those few moments of intense pain. You definitely don’t want the females hanging around your house where small children might accidentally get stung.
What will next week’s horror of nature be? You’ll just have to wait to find out…
~Anne
Tidbits
In other words, it is time for all the sciences to adopt a geologic respect for time and its capacity to transfigure, destroy, renew, amplify, erode, propagate, entwine, innovate, and exterminate. Fathoming deep time is arguably geology’s single greatest contribution to humanity.
Recently eaten: a fine breakfast today at Totem Family Diner, on the way to get my new iPhone. We didn’t want to wait two hours for the phone at the Apple Store, so we walked over to the Verizon store and I ordered one which will be delivered to my door. Note to self - it’s not always worth it to do something in person…
Making: having a right lark with the A.I. Inktober prompts. I’m particularly proud of my “tiny cod Flames rise” and my “knife-wrestling scream.”
Reading: plugging away at A Song For a New Day, and Keep Going: 10 Ways to Stay Creative in Good Times and Bad.
Videos of the Week
A side of Ginger Baker you’re less likely to hear about…
Question of the Week
If you feel like answering the question (or to just say hello), hit reply to this email. Answers will be shared next week - always anonymous.
What makes you happy?
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Last week I asked who you would like to spend a year researching and writing the biography of.
I would like to research Elise Olmstead. She sounds amazing:
https://digitalcollections.lib.washington.edu/digital/collection/imlsmohai/id/559
http://www.theradiohistorian.org/Seattle/kjr%20komo%20history.htm
"In 1924, Roy Olmstead divorced his wife and married Elise Campbell, a young English woman he had met in Canada. They bought a large mansion they called the “Snow White Palace” at 3757 Ridgeway Place in the posh Mount Baker district of Seattle. Shortly afterwards, Olmsted joined forces with Alfred M. Hubbard, a young radio engineer. Together they formed the American Radio Telephone Company, and Hubbard set to work building a 1,000 Watt transmitter which was installed in a spare bedroom of the Olmsted home. Elise Olmsted became a regular on the radio station, hosting a nightly program of children’s bedtime stories. However, prohibition agents were suspicious that Mrs. Olmsted’s broadcasts were really coded messages sending instructions to the Olmsted rumrunner boats in the Puget Sound."
I’d love to write ex navy seal David Goggins bio. Henry Rollins would be depressingly delightful. Bill Murray would be an honor and it would also most probably be an impossible rubicon.
I'm forever falling down wikiwormholes and getting interested in past personages, but I keep thinking about is this sculptor, who at the age of 18 was taking on an impressive commission https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie-Anne_Collot
Only rivaled by Madame Lavoisier https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie-Anne_Paulze_Lavoisier
Either Olga of Kiev, Sarah Winchester, or some badass, underappreciated woman from history.
My husband’s grandfather, who remains a mystery. Was he American, or Canadian? Where did he go and what did he do after he abandoned his British family? Are there relatives here in the states, as he is rumored to have started another family?
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