creepy insect husk pictures

[elanya]

I was waiting for the bus the other day, and I saw this creepy giant bug perched on the bus shelter frame. It kind of looked like a big wingless bee, so of course I was intrigued.... except it didn't seem to be doing anything. Further investigation revealed that it was just a shell. Was it some kind of larvae? Eater from the inside out by a spider? Who can say! It was firmly grabbing on to the post, even in death, in impressive defiance of gravity. I poked it but it stayed stuck there. It is gone now - I wonder what happened to it?

ETA: It is a cicada shell (thanks aghrivaine!)




A bit of a perspective shot. the thing was probably about three or four inches long (6-8 cm?)


Here you can see where it is split open along the back, and hollowed out inside


One from the other side - check the spiderwebs


And one looking down from above, for extreme creepy!

Comments

[insertfancyname.livejournal.com]

3 or 4 inches????! fucking hell! i´m NEVER going to texas

[elanya.livejournal.com]

my memory may be exagerating slightly -_-

But hey, I've never seen anything liek it *alive*.... :o

[insertfancyname.livejournal.com]

urrrh, hailing from the great north i´m freaked out as soon as the bugs hit the 1 inch mark, hahah

[elanya.livejournal.com]

Hee! Okay, maybe Texas is not the place for you then, no ^-^

[insertfancyname.livejournal.com]

hahah, i know, i´m always all "ooo, that sounds nice, i really want to go to... oh, wait, the bugs. the spiders. ughhhhh." :shudders:

[sorceror.livejournal.com]

Hey, at least it isn't a walrus. :-P

[elanya.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure Walruses aren't native to Texas ^_^

[aghrivaine.livejournal.com]

It's a cicada shell. Sometimes people call 'em locusts, too - but they're more properly called cicadas.

[elanya.livejournal.com]

Cool! I wondered, but I didn't know that cicadas moulted. I certainly hear enough of them around though :o

[aghrivaine.livejournal.com]

Yep. My dog used to go bonkers leaping up onto the trunks of trees to knock the skins down and eat them.

And many's the grade school science project that involved the morphology of the cicada pupa, I can tell you!

[rumor-esq.livejournal.com]

1 to 3 inches!

Makes me think of wolf spiders, which I think live in your area. I remember seeing a post on a message board from a guy in arizona. He took a picture of one on his bedroom wall, crawling out from under his dinner-plate sized, circular wall clock. Taking into account the span, it was a big as the friggin' clock.

It was a pretty creepy photo.

[rumor-esq.livejournal.com]

Also, naming them wolf spiders? That is fairly awesomenuts.

[elanya.livejournal.com]

We have them in NB. I've seen them, but not that big!

[wererogue.livejournal.com]

Wolf Spiders are awesome and also kinda scary, as much as spiders get scary.

[curtana.livejournal.com]

Hee, wolf spiders now always make me think of Wolf the Drow from this comic...and conveniently, he's promimently featured in today's strip! ;)