4.21.2010

pagoda 6...

The Wednesday morning "Pagoda" series chronicles the almost 5 years we spent turning a Pagoda into our home. 

Last week, we took a look at some of the house demolition.  The demo that went on while we were still living in the house.  This week, for a little break, I thought I'd share some photos of the various critters we encountered along the way. 

There were a few snakes...




Can you see that one?  Just above where you're reading right now, it's black with yellow stripes.  It was HUGE - over 4 feet long.  That one kind of creeped me out.

We've dealt with several, several, mucho, tons, lots and lots and lots of these...


Don't pak rats look cute?  They're not!  They eat my agave plants.  Okay, they are kind of cute, but still, they eat my plants.  I can't tell you how many of these we relocated.  Oh, they also eat my cactus, I took this photo yesterday, looks like somebody found their way back...


 There were also a couple of these.  These kind of look like pak rats, but they aren't...


These are baby bunnies.  Still had their eyes closed.  There was an incident with our dog Jake, but I was faster than him (and I had a cast on on my leg), so they were saved (if you knew me, you would understand that if they hadn't been saved, I would still be recovering in some mental institution).  Andrew Henry took care of everything, until one day, they just hopped away.

The cute is over.  The icky is here (more than the snakes).  This grotesque thing was running across our driveway one night.  We were pulling in and he was so big, we actually saw him in the headlights, running along the ground.  I was FREAKING OUT.  This, my dear friends, is called a "camel spider"...


It's not even a spider - part of the scorpion family.  Do you see that it is about 3 inches long?  It had 10 legs!  10!  It had pinchers.  Pinchers!  It was kind of albino like!  Albino like!  I'd never even heard of them.  We looked it up.  They can run 10 mph.  More freaking out by me.

One night, during the construction, when Andrew Henry was sleeping on a small mattress on the floor.  Wait, let me explain, we got robbed quite a few times during all of this, so, during the portion of the remodel that we had to move out, AH came back and periodically slept here.  Now, one night while he was sleeping on a mattress on the concrete floor, with the only other thing in the house being an alarm clock, one of these things CRAWLED ACROSS HIS HAND.  He didn't tell me for a long time because he was worried I would never sleep here.  He was probably right.

Which "creepy" creeped you out the most?

You will definitely want to come back later today for my own little Antiques Roadshow story...

15 comments:

Chris said...

OMG any and all(apart from the bunnies) would terrify the bejebus out of me. Would be walking round the house with the belt on ..you now like Men at Work, hooked inside of which would be every insect and rodent killer known to man. I mean I do know that the outside world is full of other creatures and I do have a very large garden but I prefer not to think of them actually being there!!!

Maria said...

OK - here in the tropics of FL, we have our fair share of creepy crawlies - I have held snakes that were so tiny, they didn't span the length of my hand (held b/c I read that their teeth were so tiny they couldn't puncture your skin) and I have seen - from at least 3 ft away - snakes longer than I am tall. Have even had them send me 3 feet into the air as they went racing into the preserve b/c I came around the corner of my house and surprised us both! We have our scorpions - never very large - 2" usually, and yes, there are spiders - everywhere. They are mostly little spindly things though, wispy almost. And I have armadillos and bobcats, LOADS of water fowl that wander through the yard - Bray's faves are the Sandhill Cranes. And yes, we have our precious little bunnies that we love and admire so.

That said - we have NEVER gotten close enough (or even the presence of mind in the middle of an encounter) to grab our cameras! What wonderful shots (some I can't believe you got close enough to take (hello zoom feature!) I know you said the striped snake was huge - but that coiled one has a menacing, ominous, gonna bite ya look to it (and it looks HUGE to me!)

What's creepiest? Camel Spider - hands down! Shouldn't be called a spider - needs its own category! (I thought spiders, by definition, had 8 legs!) The thought of it crawling on AH - well I got the triple willies with a shiver and an audible whoo! Keeps creeping me out! Focus on the precious bunnies, bunnies, think bunnies!

You guys are a little crazy, and a lot brave!

Henley said...

The camel spider is tied with that black snake. OMG.

KR said...

I do respect all of God's creatures, however the word 'fear' comes to mind instead of ' creep me out' when looking at the coiled snake. I try very hard not to show fear when I encounter any 'creatures'. The Camel Spider is rather ugly but at the same time interesting.
I love how you have documented all of this with photos.

MJM said...

ONE CREPT ACROSS HIS HAND?!?!?!?! I never knew that, and I will now be sleeping at the condo whenever I am home. Definitely the camel spider, definitely.

Megan (Best of Fates) said...

Whoa.

You are far, far stronger than I could ever be.

sarah said...

arizona is just generally a creepy place to be.....on one branch of our family tree my kids can call themselves 7th generation arizonaian! lots of family stories about killing critters! everyone laughs about one great granny who would sit in her little rocker and just reach over and casually pick up her rifle and shoot a rat as it ran thru the house! my son once caught a taranchula as big as my hand print in our living room! it's the wild west for sure!

jeanette from everton terrace said...

Ha, think that's a granny I would have liked - not the killing part, just the spunk!

RockinJ9designs said...

Lucky You! You get to find all the King Snakes. Why is it our luck that the Rattle Snakes find the shade along side our house so comforting.Before letting the children out to play, I have to do a perimeter check.WALK TALL and carry a BIG STICK! Did you know that a rattle snakes rattle is hollow. The rattling sound comes from the vibration of the different rattles against each other(up to 50 per second).Thank You "Bindi The Jungle Girl"

Andrew H. said...

Don't worry daughter, we haven't seen any of those camel spiders in the house since just before Easter. ;-)

Actually, the one that was on my arm was the last we have seen.

When that happened, I felt something on my arm. Figured it was a cricket or something so I shoook my arm a little to get it off. Then I felt it move again and thought that's no cricket. I shook harder and jumped off the mattress, grabbed my flashlight (no power yet) and saw that thing on the floor.

I put a 5 gallon bucket over it and went back to sleep. I could hear it trying to get out...

Maria said...

Ewwww!
AH - you are still my hero!

Kanga said...

The spider gets my vote. In Australia we have spiders and snakes of the most venomous kind but it is the things with legs which really make me cringe.

MaiPie said...

Camel spider. Definitely. I don't really have issues with the critters in the desert, but that one just looks evil. Remind me to never remodel anything. I don't want to play hide and seek with the critters.

Cashon&Co said...

okay that big snake would freak me out.
my 7 year old son will want to see this scorpion variation you got there! very fun! i hope these guys don't return to your site when you build your home, i hope they leave for good!

Unknown said...

hahaha i second maia...not that i would be ever caught remodeling anything. tools? nope. it is really creepy to see a camel spider sprint across a room. difficult to catch them, not that our mom allowed us to, because they eat crickets (ever watched that?! its incredible! one moment cricket is there, the next its gone!) scorpions are worse than camel spiders though, in that they hurt when you get too close. boo desert creepy crawlies!!