real toys from when i was a kid

[Faunaofthenorth]

i was thinking the other day, when i was a neonate lol jk but no seriously, i lived off and on at my parents house and my grandparents house because my mother owned a college in a town a few hours away and my dad was the "furnace doctor" around the iron range, which he owned his own furnace company so when they were away i was by myself and my grandpappys house with my little bro, and i was thinking that when i wanted all the jurassic park toys and never had any, i turned to the real world for my toys....animals!!!! lol while all the other kids were playing sports, now this was still when i was very very young like from 3-now, and they hap power ranger toys and barbies, i was out catching spiders, beeltes, bees, yes...bees, and snakes, and frogs, and anything else that was supposed to be yucky, and i would play with them for hours and days and months. i used to get picked on at school for protecting a little spider from being smooshed or from keeping the bat clinging to the wall in the morning from being tortured, thats what i was like, and i enjoyed it. Im sure some of you other guys were too. i remember i would run and hide and not come out and sometimes cry whenever my dad would shoot a squirrel even when i was three...hmmm fun times well not for the squirrel

[Snakeknot]

I had a pet wasp! I used to feed him honey. ( Probably not what a wasp eats but then I was a kid. ) I also had a pet charlotte's web type spider until she had 3 egg sacks and they all hatched at once and got out of the tank and made a web up to the light. Funny 'cause I can't stand spiders now especially if they're big and furry. I won't kill them but I will relocate them from inside the house. BTW we live in spider heaven! The old dog brought in a garden spider one day on its head and tried to wipe it off on my legs. Hubby wondered what I was shrieking about!

Devon

[guidofatherof5]

I had a pet wasp! I used to feed him honey. ( Probably not what a wasp eats but then I was a kid. ) I also had a pet charlotte's web type spider until she had 3 egg sacks and they all hatched at once and got out of the tank and made a web up to the light. Funny 'cause I can't stand spiders now especially if they're big and furry. I won't kill them but I will relocate them from inside the house. BTW we live in spider heaven! The old dog brought in a garden spider one day on its head and tried to wipe it off on my legs. Hubby wondered what I was shrieking about!

Devon

Goooood dog, goooood dog:D

[gregmonsta]

For me it was charging through the countryside. I would catch anything I could and went through different phases. It started with random collections like crickets, beetles, spiders, etc in a box (a day later that usually meant one exceedingly happy spider) .... I started to enjoy feeding spiders .... :eek: .... frongs n toads would join the party (making for fat croakers) ... I encountered salamanders and newts but soon stuck with reptiles after starting to catch lizards and slow-worms as 'pets for the night'. I caught the same two lizards on several occaisions .... they became like friends that would come to visit (although it probably wasn't their first choice of accomodation lol).

[Faunaofthenorth]

haha great i know exactly what you guys are saying, man those were some fun times, the weird creatures of nature were my toys lol, and yea for about 4 years i was obsessed with spiders, ive had at least three tarantulas since then, and the movie arachnophobia used to be my favorite movie when i was little besides jurassic park, man fun times

[ConcinusMan]

I got a very cool spider in my house too. Been here a couple of years now, and before that, there were 2 other generations. It looks just like a small black widow, but not that black, and not that shiny. It's definitely not a widow. But anyway, she's really mellow and stays in her corner. She's near the back door which is in a portion of what used to be part of the garage but was walled off and made into a pantry.

My dad came over and was going to squash her, and I said "Noooo!" He thought I was nuts harboring a spider but she does no harm, eats small flying insects that come in, so why kill her?

I think this is her last year with us. She had a male in her web a few weeks ago and now she's looking really fat. There are a few tiny one's of her kind back there too, that were hatched last year so life will go on.

[Faunaofthenorth]

sweet thatd be cool

[ConcinusMan]

My girlfriend is terrified of spiders. And yet, one built an orb web right in front of her living room window last summer. A huge one! She liked to watch her build her web and didn't kill it even though she's terrified of them. How cool is that?

It was one of these: http://www.taos-telecommunity.org/epow/EPOW-Archive/archive_2003/EPOW-031215_files/Araneus_diadematus_13_s.jpg

This girl by her window was nearly as big as a silver dollar!

[Faunaofthenorth]

that's awesome, whe i was a kid i used to liek to throw asian longhorn beetles, which if you know what they are theya re effin nasty buggers, they acn chew through cardcoard like cheese, and i used to have "asianlonghornbeetleaphobio" lol and so i would catch them and throw them in orb weaver nests and watch them get annhilated, same with deerflies which up here can get two almost an inch in length, and they bite like hell, i throw deer flies in funnel webs and watch them get torn up, its cruel but fun at the same time, a pet store up here has a baby pink toe goliath, which looks like a fuzzy miny tarantula, i was so tempted

[ConcinusMan]

Funnel web spiders scare the hello out of me. I don't think I could do that. In San Diego, if we happen to get a soaking rain in the summer time, trapdoor spiders could be found crawling on hillsides. Those scare the hello out of me too. And yet, pet store tarantulas (and tarantulas found in the CA desert) don't bother me. Weird huh?

[Faunaofthenorth]

yea, well i'm talking about the little grass spiders, is what they are really called but they make those sweet little funnel webs, all over and they can get pretty effin big sometimes though

[ConcinusMan]

oh, those. They give me the creeps but I'm not scared of them. We got similar spiders here that don't build webs at all. They just crawl around in the grass with egg sacks on their backs. Very fragile little spiders. You just touch them and legs fall off. They were a favorite food for my fence lizards some years back.

[Faunaofthenorth]

hmm neat

[Holly]

My mom said I brought home a rattler once. I doubt it, probably just a really big garter with a diamond pattern down it's back.

I remember bringing home a really big snake once and her freaking out, maybe that was the time, I think I was about 4, I remember I had a hand around it's neck and another hand around it's middle section with my arms stretched way out and it's tail was still dragging. I was very proud of myself.

I recall the snake having a diamond pattern down it's back and I remember gray and maybe red, I'm pretty sure it didn't have a rattle on it.

[aSnakeLovinBabe]

As a kid, I was fully convinced I wanted to be an entemologist. I collected insects from everywhere I went and pinned specimens to boards, and labeled them. Every late summer I would acquire a small army of adult praying mantids, feed them constantly, and carefully pair them up when the female was at her fullest so that she would hopefully not eat my male. Then I would put the girls out in "their tree" (we had a tree against the wall on the side of the house about 6 foot tall that harbored the mantids... and they would not leave it!) So that they could lay their egg sacks. Then I would bring them back in the house so that they would live as long as possible, usually into november. I was enamoured with mantids and still am, actually. I slowly realized I liked snakes but it was hard to get my parents to let me get what I thought then was a "real" snake... Bandit, my california kingsnake. It took from the time I was 10, to 14, to get him but I got him and now look at me :rolleyes:

[Faunaofthenorth]

haha nice, sweet story, i feel ya, my mom once caught me constantly going outside then into the basement, and when she asked me why i was going in and out i said nothing but she watched me poor a jar full of spiders on the floor of our basement lol, i was going in and out letting hundreds of spiders go in my basement when i was around 4 lol funny, i always wanted to see a mantis of some sort thought it would be cool and still do

[ssssnakeluvr]

I had house spiders in my room. would let dust build up on the floor under my bed...home for carpet beetles and their larva. I would use the larva during the winter to feed the spiders. I also fed spiders outside all the time. Loved the cat spiders!!

[Faunaofthenorth]

hah yea lots of fun

[mustang]

i used to...and sometimes still will grab anoles and let em go in back yard when we moved i ransaked the neighboorhood and now 3or 4 maybe 5 years later im on 5th generation ...not pets just breeding...found a somewhat red anole (reds a morph) and i know it wasnt brown....when it rains i always turn over buckets so they can have water...parents get mad caus of mosquitoes

[ConcinusMan]

Can't blame them for that. Besides that, anoles would better benefit from a shady planted area that receives a daily watering with a sprinkler. No need for standing water.