As a child, I loved to learn and explore. One of my favorite things to do was go digging in the dirt, wading in the swamps, and climbing through the trees looking for bugs or anything creepy crawly. I especially liked doodle bugs (aka rollie pollies), caterpillars, grasshoppers, worms and butterflies. Fear of bugs was not an issue, though with age I’m not as ecstatic about having one of these creatures crawling on me without prior knowledge. All of
God’s creations have always fascinated me, especially how they work together to survive and the different mechanisms that evolved so these creatures could survive in their own elements (ie a grasshoppers amazing ability to hop super long distances in comparison to it’s size, a doodle bugs ability to roll into a tiny ball of protection, a caterpillars ability to consume unbelievable amounts of food just so it can turn into a beautiful butterfly.)
I still revel in this fascination to this day. I found a huge slug on the sidewalk a few months ago and was absolutely floored by it’s size (it could easily cover the entire palm of my hand) and gooeyness, i couldn’t help but stop to observe it and then proceed to poke it gently with a stick. It’s funny how now, I can’t imagine picking up a slug with my bare hands, but as a child I wouldn’t of missed out on the opportunity…
I remember the doodle bugs also, there are tons of them in my compost these days. Did you find the palm-sized slug in Jacksonville? A slug that big sounds exotic to me, but I’m often surprised. I was always fascinated by insects and such from a comfortable distance, never the first to reach out and grab something but always captivated and curious.
Yes! it was in Riverside, I was so fascinated by it too. Sadly, I haven’t seen one again since, I wish I had taken a pic, but that was a few years back, prior to my addiction to instagram 🙂