WAR!

I am a man of peace. ‘Live and let live’ is a motto I respect and abide by, and I want nothing more than to exist in harmony with those around me.

However that all changed in 1995 when I first encountered a real life cockroach after moving into an apartment in Columbus, Ohio. I never knew that I could come to hate a living thing as fervently as I came to hate those filthy, skittering vermin. The best story ever to come out of those troubled years involved a box of raisin bran. While trying to pour the cereal into a bowl, the stuff ended up spilling all over the counter. It was while trying to corral the scattered bran flakes into a pile for reinsertion that one of the raisins began to quickly scurry away. At times like this that a funny thing happened to me: a kind of Berserker rage would grip me and I would find my nostrils reflexively flaring and my eyes widening before savagely lunging at my uninvited guest with intent to kill. These were not the large variety of cockroach found here in Queensland, which can be up to 2 or 3 inches in length, but the half inch variety so common in cities. There was absolutely nothing to love about them. At least the appearance of a cockroach here was rare and because of their size, they were easily dispatched despite the ability to fly. No. During my sojourn in Oz it was the common mosquito I grew to hate most.

There were at least two common breeds here and both were not only bloodthirsty, but also insidiously clever and seemed to get into the house even when every door and window had been closed. Once I was laying in bed watching videos and kept feeling the need to itch the back of my shoulder. I finally caught a mozzie in the act and dealt with him, but by that time I had six or seven lumps in the area of the itch where it had bitten me, faded away, and then returned several times in the space of about fifteen minutes.

My biggest concern was trying to keep them out of my bedroom while I was teaching, yet somehow they always found their way in and waited under the desk for me to sit down. I really didn’t want to have students see me acting calm one minute and then wildly spasming as I swatted at a sudden mosquito with complete abandon, perhaps even lunging over the desk in pursuit. Those little suckers were a constant headache until the colder months came and they disappeared for a time.  But that war was far from over.

My next concern was the huntsman spiders that always got in, but these were harmless and rarely bit unless physically harmed. They actually seemed quite satisfied to perch on an arm or shoulder if picked up, but I can only honestly say that about one of the two varieties I encountered.

The ones I learned to handle without fear were the Flat Huntsman variety. These would try to flatten themselves out to make themselves less conspicuous or stretch themselves out to fit into wall corners. They were seldom hard to spot against the beige walls here, seldom hard to catch, and always seemed to strategically position themselves to provide a good jump scare. I found one hiding behind my soap dispenser in the bathroom once, found one in a corner of the bathroom wall by the light switch I had just put my hand on, and a couple on walls through the house. These never bit, that I experienced, and I never found one in my bedroom except for the one that found its way into the heater to try to stay warm. I regrettably killed two by accident, but was able to catch and release the others. It’s strange to admit, but there was something actually cute about those spiders as they looked like disgusting but dopey little teddy bears. Horrifying factoids: these spiders are often responsible for vehicle roll-overs as they sometimes dash across windscreens or dashboards and frighten the driver, they are said to ‘scream’, and they molt leaving skeletal skins behind that hang in random places a bit like dead face-huggers. They also like to rest on the backs of drying bath towels and have the bad habit of jumping off walls while people below are trying to catch them.

The other variety of huntsman I never actually invited to climb onto my bare arm. This was the Brown Huntsman. These, according to the Queensland Museum, ‘bite readily with a strong bite and may hang on’. My first introduction to this breed was finding one in my knife drawer. After a start I began to laugh thinking that surely this must have been one of Tuula’s little jokes, leaving a fake spider here to scare someone. Fortunately mid grab I thought better of it and got a plastic measuring cup to first see if it was actually real, since this was Australia after all. Indeed it was. Thankfully it climbed right into the container and I was able to get it out of there. But since it was cold out that night, I left him in an upside down cup overnight with just enough room for a tiny amount of air to get in so he wouldn’t die before I could throw him outside. By the next morning, however, the spider had escaped it’s prison and was in all likelihood back in a drawer somewhere plotting my demise. I found another one in the bathtub one night and threw it outside immediately! This species made quite a display of their fangs, so I never tried to handle them with my bare hands. Horrifying factoid: its eyes reflect light and they often lay their egg sacks in shower drains.

Fortunately geckos are said to be natural predators and I had a couple of these patrolling the walls at night.

The third front in the war on vermin was against pigeons. I had generally considered them to be harmless and fairly stupid birds, but I learned they can actually do real damage, or rather their droppings can. Over time a pigeon can deposit quite a lot of these around areas where people live. In time this dung turns to dust and said dust may contain various bird borne diseases that can be absorbed but unwittingly breathing it in as it drifts on the wind. But it was their stupid tenacity and complete lack of consideration for anyone but themselves that won my ire.

During the first several months there was a pair living in a space above the back stairs. They were encouraged to leave their roost thanks to a hawk decoy. The holes where they were getting in were stopped up and so that particular problem was solved. However some time later it became apparent that they were now making a nest in the eaves of the veranda outside my bedroom door. Now you may have heard the sound of pigeons before, but they can actually coo quite loudly. They got in the habit of gathering outside the door each morning around six and making noise.

At first I would run though the house when I heard them and emerge onto the porch to scare them away, but they always came back and twenty minutes later they be loudly cooing again and the process would repeat. Getting tired of this I then began smacking the wall loudly to send them away. But they were persistent.

The next step was to place an owl decoy on the porch and hope that would discourage them. It didn’t. They would sit right next to it and one time even nudged it off its perch to get past it. So much for that idea.

Next came an invention I called ‘The Scare Mo’, a seated scarecrow built of clothes, to give the impression of a constant human presence. This worked for about a day but then they were back again. But I think it may have creeped out the neighbors a bit though. At least they would think twice about trying to build nests.

My final attempt to discourage the pigeons from returning was to stop up the roosting spaces with cardboard so that they couldn’t find anywhere to make a nest. Fortunately I had a stockpile of Food Works boxes to work with. Part of the reason the birds had been so loud, I discovered, was a pair of eggs in a nest they had built (right next to the owl, no less). I removed them and set about sealing things up. The next step after this would have involved lethal means and I was trying to avoid resorting to that. Fortunately the cardboard worked though and they haven’t come back. But for a couple of months it was an ongoing battle!

Finally came my long awaited encounter with a Redback spider. I was not at war with these, but moreso just fascinated. I had heard about the grave dangers that these arachnids posed, but I didn’t see one for several months. When I finally did I was very surprised by how small they were, only about the size of a pea. But for as small a creature as it is, it’s venom is capable of causing severe pain and even death. Since antivenom was developed, however, fatalities have been almost non existent. The spider’s jaws are so small that they sometimes fail to break the skin when attempting a bite. Even when one is successful, an envenomation may go unreported because of the resulting symptoms being very mild and non life threatening. I had no wish to be bitten, but there is something fascinating about a creature that could theoretically end one’s life. The closest we have in Ohio is the Black Widow, but in over forty years I have never seen one. However the fact that Fiona Craig actually bred and raised Redbacks shows that they are not deadly so long as you’re careful and treat the with due respect and care. Factoid: For as innocuous as daddy long legs spiders are, they apparently kill and eat redbacks! Respect. 

The deadliest spider in Australia is the Funnel Web spider, but they are all in the Southeast of the country. A bite from this spider can kill a person in fifteen minutes! Even though the Redback’s venom is more deadly, it generally doesn’t act nearly as quickly. Fortunately I don’t have to worry about them here.

Of course in addition to the unappealing creatures were also a great many inoffensive insects. The jewel bugs came in various colorful hues as did a variety of moths and butterflies.

In the next post let’s go back to spending some time with the beautiful creatures once again as well as meeting some new friends.

WARNING: Spiders below…

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