What animals make you cringe?

@abhijatshakya was not condoning the actions of the villagers. He wanted to save the snakes, but old habits die hard, especially for organisms with potentially lethal consequences. @abhijatshakya may belong to iNat, but it sounds like the people he closely lives with don’t share the same outlook.

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I didn’t think he was. My last “sentiment” was about topic as a whole.

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I love parasitology, and came see that any habitat, including humans and other organisms is merely that - a habitat. Life adapts to whatever will sustain them. I respect parasites - they live in environments which are actively trying to kill them. I would prefer not to have one, and do not wish them on anything. But Life is not ‘fair’, so they do exist.
Oh, and @thewobe, welcome to the forum!

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I misinterpreted. I apologize for that, my friend.

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I thought that article on sloths was pretty interesting. I’m glad I got to read it— thanks.

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What would really make me cringe: if there were parasitoids of humans.

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Flies. For some reason, I’m alright with huge spiders, scorpions, centipedes etc. But whenever I see a fly larger than a centimetre in length I begin to stress out

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Do non-invasive introduced species count?

I don’t really mind them.

Weak animals make me cringe.
The koala :koala: is unintelligent, asocial, defenseless, slow, and won’t eat eucalyptus leaves unless they’re still attached to the plant.
The scent gland placement on male koalas, and the way females feed babies once lactation stops, are also gross and awkward.

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Their life cycle is deeply disturbing, but it’s even weirder that adult botflies are really cute, with big heads relative to their body size and enormous Disney eyes. In this case, at least for me, it’s not the critter itself that makes me cringe…it’s how it got its start in life.

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I totally agree that the “nope” and “kill it with fire” discussions on social media need to stop, and hinder conservation/education efforts, but this discussion has been interesting. In a community of people who clearly love and appreciate nature, it’s probably valuable to examine our reactions to those organisms that evoke negative responses, mostly for the purpose of challenging those thoughts and identifying their sources. That can make us better ambassadors for nature on the whole, I think.

There’s a fine line between fear and fascination, and it’s sometimes possible to transmute one into the other. I have an entomologist friend who was terribly arachnophobic: she solved this problem by getting a pet tarantula, and now she’s cool with spiders in general. (I would not want to pull off this kind of self-imposed exposure therapy with a botfly or a chigoe flea, though.)

In my case, ticks make me cringe and I can summon no love for them at all, even though I’d still iNat them with pleasure. I’m also deeply creeped out by pycnogonids, but it’s easy to deal with that because I don’t run into them very often.

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This sort of judging from human angle can be a distraction from respecting that it’s a well adapted animal that lives in a place with a few predators. Humans aren’t really strong, everything can kill us, and that’s a plant eater, brains are not needed when your food is sitting still and is all around you, brains require a lot of energy that you can’t get from plants.
Scent gland on chest I think is much cuter than paraanal glads our common pets have, or glands on cheecks and legs.
People don’t mind cows eating half-processed food from their stomachs, or rabbits and rodents for eating their (and others’) scat, just because that’s not how humans eat, it’s not a bad thing, plus, it’s a plant matter feces, I think they’re much easier to handle than what’s going out of meat-eating animals, THAT stinks, though it doesn’t stop puppies from eating it too.)

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I love softshell turtles, but when they extend their penis as a defence method/during reproduction I always find it to be really creepy and gross looking… lol.

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But it doesn’t compare with sounds turtle make when mating! :rofl:

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Oh amigo, How do you call “baby” ticks? chiggers (early tick stages)? they LOVE me, and we have plenty of them in some areas, I hate them, and leeches give me cringe… centipedes I love them, but I am scared of their “pinch”.

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I have had Katsaridaphobia (fear of cockroaches) my whole life. And I mean a REAL phobia. I’ve lost many nights of sleep crying thinking of the possibility one could be crawling on me. I live in Texas, where they can and do get 2 inches long. (5cm) and they move extremely fast, and some can fly, if they are 1cm or smaller they don’t bother me, but the bigger they are the more horrifying. Although it’s mainly their dorsal and ventral sides that disturb me. I can pretty easily look at their faces. They have beautiful eyes! I’m definitely not as afraid of them as I used to be, and don’t lose sleep over them anymore. But man, I wish I could love them, but I don’t know they just freak me out! Specifically the deep red-orange ones near me, there are some species from other countries that look gorgeous!

I’ve always wondered whether Katsaridaphobia or Arachnophobia is more common (in Texas)
Because I was never as afraid of spiders as I was with roaches. I would say I never had arachnophobia, just a mild fear or even discomfort of cellar spiders. As a kid, I was basically afraid in some way of all (what I would have called them as a kid) “bugs” like spiders, crane flies, roaches, June bugs, wasps, bees, moths and so on. The only ones I actually liked were ants, butterflies, ladybugs, dragonflies/damselflies, and isopods.

But now, basically the only fear that still stands is that of roaches.

I hope to one day not feel afraid of them. :)

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We had leeches in the pond in our previous home. When my husband waded in to clear excess water plants, he came out with tiny leeches on his feet.

But an absolute no when I realised (invasive and exotic) cockroaches FLY! The only time I reached for insecticide.

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I’m always really nervous when observing blach cockroaches (Blatta orientalis), because they have a habit of running right to you at great speed and it’s a nightmare.

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I’ve only seen a wild cockroach one time in my life. It was at a McDonald’s.

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