Saturday, September 19, 2009

Fun with Entomology

We have quite the assortment of bugs around the church building. Including this critter, which Dustin left on my desk a few weeks ago in a plastic cup!




What is this thing? Some horrible cross between a grasshopper and a cockroach? I really haven't been able to identify this thing. I have other pictures this forsaken thing, with its armored head and roach-like limbs. Any ideas, anybody?

Then we have this, the largest praying mantis I've ever seen.




This thing was 7 or 8 inches long, about twice as big as any mantis I'd ever seen before.

I live two miles from the church and we don't a fraction of the fauna the church property does. Snakes, frogs, ground hogs, raccoons, deer, endless varieties of birds and more insects than any place you've ever seen.

3 comments:

Christi said...

Ask Jerad. He was an entomology geek in 4H and always knows what bugs are what.

Anonymous said...

J was also an entomology geek...I mean expert. He thinks it is a mole cricket but can't quite see the front feet to make a definitive identification.

Dustin said...

YEAH! The Coopers are geniuses!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mole_cricket

That's exactly what it is! I found two of them within 5 minutes in the main room at church one Saturday. I killed the first one, then captured the second one and left it in a cup on Jared's desk as a gift.