Creatures and creepy crawleys we have encountered in Thailand

This week has been a slow week as we have been working on our CV's and will start job hunting, so we thought we would take the time to introduce you to some of the creepy crawleys we've seen since arriving here. Now they're also a snack to a lot of Thai' s and we did try some first time around and they taste like burnt popcorn. They all taste the same as they are deep fried so its more like an empty shell its more the visual of putting a large beetle or cockroach in your gob.

We will start with the ones who have rudely invited themselves into our rooms unannounced, and who then proceeded to scare the crap out of us. If you are not a fan of creepy crawleys, look away now, cos Thailand has some weird ones and we have only seen the ones from wet season. We still have the dry season critters to arrive.

We will start with the enemies first and show you the allies later, the allies are the creatures working with us who eat these critters so we are more than happy to let them hang around.   
So first off we have the dragon flies. These guys are beautiful and they are everywhere, they move at lightning speed but hover like helicopters, so it's pretty amazing to watch them swarm around after a heavy rain fall. Near water and lakes, which are everywhere, you see huge groups of them also.


With most of the bugs around here they keep to themselves and are not afraid of people, so they stay quite still for pictures.

Next we have, what we have described them as "Fish bugs".
We have seen a lot of them around but they move so quick it is very hard to get a pictures off but these guys are crazy looking. They look very similar to fishing lures but not knowing what they can do, we usually avoid them.



This next group are bugs that, whoever created them was pure evil, as they are the things of nightmares... 
So everyone knows centipedes and cockroaches and thank fully we don't see that many cockroaches very often, as something about the way they move, seems unnatural to us, they move like a shadow. Then the centipede we seen was quite big and we know that they have some centipede that are poisonous so we got the picture and got out asap.

They have a lot of these beetle things around also and we've seen some on the road bit enough to make me swerve to avoid from fear that they may try to topple us and bring us back to their layer.
Oh did we mention we are not a fan of bugs, at home I (Stephen) would spend hours chasing a common house fly out of the house or leave the room if a small spider came, usually happy to sign over the apartment to him and pack my bags :) 


Thailand also has some cool bugs like these green guys a mix between praying mantis grasshoppers and these can be found everywhere, and I mean everywhere. 
They seem to enjoy the camera so I've taken quite a few pics of these guys. If you hang around too long though they will get bored possibly as the last one decided to fly directly into my face and flutter about.
I (Stephen) screamed like a girl before he was happy he had humiliated me and got out of there. 
Kristine was in stitches, pointing and laughing at me...

So we mentioned earlier that we are not a fan of bugs and if you go further north we found one of these guys on our last trip but the one we found was already dead, after seeing this pic I may leave trekking off for a while...

The allies

Now we have the guys who eat the critters our friends and allies.  The lizards and geckos hang around outside our apartment and eat a lot of the mosquito's and other bugs and some of the smaller ones will hang out in our room, they keep to themselves so we have no issues with them. 

In the campus we see hundreds of small bird who do the same and they are friendly enough to come up and eat food from your hands.

 
We have also seen some snakes around but were advised they will not come close to us and they eat spiders, so well done snakes.
They are also suppose to taste quite nice but we haven't seen anywhere were we can sample them. Not too sure if we want to either. Spiders are suppose to be tasty as well but that will definitely never happen. 

We have also seen some frogs outside but they don't do too much and a couple of crabs who are curious enough to wander over to us. The crabs are closer to the lakes so no bare feet running for us.




So we had mentioned the Tarantula we've seen while jogging but just to remind you I feel he belongs in here.

So that's a few of what we've seen but I assure you, there are many more out there but they keep to themselves, so don't let any of them put you off Thailand, as it's still one of the most beautiful countries we have ever visited, but with scenic beauty comes wildlife to share it with.