Hard to Love Species

I find that, while i have a fascination for jellyfish, and believe they are extremely awesome creatures in their own right, i’m also deathly afraid of them for some reason, especially the Cyanea genus. And this year they are quite abundant in northern europe (relatively speaking)

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Wait ‘till you find a two foot iguana swimming in your toilet bowl :)

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I hate bears. When I was a small child, an aggressive bear tried to smash its way into the bus we lived in to get at us, and I never forgave the species.

Can’t stand ticks, scorpions make me kind of uncomfortable, and I really dislike torilis (“sock destroyer”).

Ah, Torilis arvensis and its relatives are pretty boring also here :-D and I quite always have to clean the socks after a field trip from june to september.
But wild barley and bromes (section Anisantha) and not better…

It’s Florida, so I’m usually ready for anything. :joy:

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Today I was at a greenhouse and there was some filamentous algae growing on a waterfall in a fish pond. A person I was with then described it as disgusting, slimy, mold and asked me if I knew of a good way to get rid of it and keep it from coming back. But when you take a close look at it, it’s quite beautiful. I think the main reason pond scum (and to a slight extent even moss) gets a bad rep is because non-naturalists tend to lump all the tiny stuff that grows in wet places together into what they often call mold. One time I got a gift of “moss” (it was actually lichen) from someone who then asked why I was so interested in bacteria such as moss. :D

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Me, too. The possum “glued” to the front door when we came back from a trip, the very smelly decomposing raccoon under the avocado tree, the mouse in the pool, were all par for the course. The iguana guarding the toilet did give me pause. And guess who had to grab it (with the longest BBQ tongs I could find) and take it outside?

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Well, that’s a failure of the educational system.

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Cockroaches and mosquitoes. I can at least tolerate or in some cases even like any other creepy crawlies, but cockroaches (especially big ones) give me a visceral disgust shudder and mosquitoes I want to kill on sight.

P.S. I realize these both serve important functions…just keep 'em away from me.
P.P.S. Hissing cockroaches are ok, because the lack of wings makes them look different from regular roaches.

Sawyer Deer Fly patches. Look them up. They do work well.

Cheatgrass (Bromus tectorum) anywhere in North America. Happy to see it in Eurasia though… :wink:

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Oh my gosh, I’d forgotten about this one! I’ve seen it go a the way through a dog’s foot (only way for it to come out, unfortunately), have to be surgically removed from their sides … not to mention that you may as well just throw away a pair socks if you accidentally get cheat in them!
I can appreciate it as a plant (same with Goatheads aka puncture weed), but only from afar :raised_hand:

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Yes, caltrops (as they are also called) are right up there on my list too! Cheatgrass takes top honors with me for the landscape-level destruction and permanent vegetation replacement that it wreaks across western North America.

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I agree with a lot of what has been written above. Some of my (least) favorites are Deerflies, Ticks, Horseflies and mosquitoes. My record for most mosquito bites was 57 in a day :mosquito:

The call of the California Scrub Jay is the most annoying thing

Sounds like a local aural equivalent of our Brown-eared Bulbuls:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJeW-yLgOyo

This isn’t a fear, but after volunteering to try to help maintain a meadow in the Northeast US for a few years, I hate mugwort with a passion that I have for few things.

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And pooping out the berries to grow in other places? Shudder.

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Things that bite me, annoy me and that can’t be chased away with modern technology (ie bug spray)

Nothing is more terrifying than Homo sapiens.

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