Do you like roly polies?

[Forboding Angel]

Cats are by their nature predators. You can't blame them for acting as they were intended. Just because they've been domesticated doesn't mean that their instincts have gone away.

Personally I love cats in a huge way (Odd that I don't own one I guess, but whatever), because a cat has a tendency to make me happy, that and I appreciate their "eat shit and die or bring me some catnip" attitudes.

[Karl]

"eat shit and die or bring me some catnip" attitudes.

Does that mean that they dont want to get petted?

well i have a housecat so

[smoth]

"cats are by nature predators"

So are dogs and fish etc.

I had a dog, it was kept on a leash or in a fence when outside. Cat owners do not do this so cats are free to irritate the nearby wildlife when set loose and thier owners have no qualm with doing so. Many even think it is cute when thier cat brings back killed animals. Let's not even start on the stray cat population

[SeanHeron]

My cousins used to tell me how they'd "teach lice to swim" - I guess that would usually end up with the lice drowning...
I think they're pretty neat little animals though :).

[fc14159]

I like cats even though I don't own one. But they're cool because they're independent. They're not your slave like dogs are, so you can actually treat them like a friend almost.

"cats are by nature predators"

So are dogs and fish etc.

I had a dog, it was kept on a leash or in a fence when outside. Cat owners do not do this so cats are free to irritate the nearby wildlife when set loose and thier owners have no qualm with doing so. Many even think it is cute when thier cat brings back killed animals. Let's not even start on the stray cat population

I don't think it's quite fair to blame cats for anything. As you said, you had your dog on a leash. What if people didn't put their dogs on leashes? It's the people who own cats and dogs who are to blame for any problem their pet causes. But even besides that, animals have enough right to "irritate wildlife." After all, that's what they were meant to do.

[Panda]

House cats do cause a lot of problems. They are not native to North America like the panther or bobcat and are responsible for making many important native species of wildlife endangered (decreasing biodiversity and making the ecosystem less stable and therefore more susceptible to disease). There are laws that were made for environmental protection about the responsibilities of cat owners to take care of their cats, not let them destroy the environment, and not let them have all kinds of kittens unless they wanted to take care of them too, but those laws are hard to enforce.

http://wildlife.wisc.edu/extension/catfly3.htm

[KaiserJ]

well, pet cats don't need to be out harassing wildlife, and are not native at least to where i live, so birds and other animals who don't have a natural predator like that are at risk.

please, if you let your cat out, put one of those little bells on their collar, so that birds and other small animals can escape. wildlife in urban areas have a tough enough time as it is with pollution and habitat loss without being hunted for sport

personally i wouldn't let a cat out around here anyways, the raccoons would eat it

[Panda]

Some of my 100 roly polies had offspring. They're little and white! This is cool!

These marine roly polies are cute too!

[bobthedinosaur]

wooo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WtMlB-BEMso






I agree. roundness and size helps?

[Caydr]

Millipedes FTW. All hail the metric insect, and the one TRUE roly-poly.

(I mean this kind: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Narce ... lipede.jpg not those giant freaks)

[SwiftSpear]

I called them sow bugs and potato bugs. There is a type that can roll up into a ball, and another type that can not. I like the bally ones better, but I one fed a bunch to fish in a coy pond I found

All sow bugs can roll up into a ball, but there are other bugs that look similar to them (species of silverfish) which can't.

I'm almost positive that's not true. We had 2 species of sow bugs in our garden when I was a kid. The ones that look like this:

Can roll up into a ball

The ones that look like this:

Cannot.

According to some website I found online when looking them up, that is actually the difference between "sow bugs" and "pill bugs" pill bugs roll up and have a half oval body structure, and sow bugs do not and have a flatter body structure, however, they look very similar, and so I'm sure many many people use the two names interchangeably.

[Panda]

You're right there is a difference between sow bugs and roly polies.

http://crawford.tardigrade.net/bugs/BugofMonth17.html

I've heard people use the names sow bugs interchangeably to mean roly polies and they seem to be referring to the ones that can roll up into a ball. It's probably because you find this kind, Armadillidium vulgare, around here commonly:



I don't recall ever seeing any European Sow Bugs like the one shown in your second picture Oniscus asellus around here, though.



This website says that they are not native to the US, have been introduced into the United States, and are found in cities and suburbs, though.

http://www.eduwebs.org/bugs/sowbug.htm

That must be why people use the terms interchangeably over here. I really thought that they were talking about the same bug too. Thanks for telling me about that. I'll have to put that in my presentation, so the other students will know the difference and be assured that all of the bugs that I bought from the scientific supplies company are of the same species and have similar genetics.

[SwiftSpear]

As a kid I didn't differentiate between them aside from the fact that some rolled up and some didn't. The non rollers were more common in my garden, so I always was excited when I found a rolly one. I called them both potato bugs or sow bugs though, I wasn't familiar with the term pill bug.

[bobthedinosaur]

http://www.trilobites.info/
I don't know if they could roll up, (I kind of doubt it), but they are freaking amazing.

[nightcold]

well when i was a kid i used to poke at them till they rolled up....then flicked them when they balled up at neighbors/playground-mangerers(amoung other targets)

i also used to step on cat's tails....alot....so yeah...



i'am shocked how much the peeps on this thread are into bugs....

[PicassoCT]

Spacekirabugo.

[fc14159]

these guys are so cool

[Panda]

Yea! My experiment on them did not show that they changed the nitrogen content of the soil after I did a bunch of soil tests, but I think that these results occurred because I did not have large enough colonies of roly polies in each tank.

However, I did get to see them have offspring twice and observed them actively molting and crawling out of their old shells one half at a time.

[rattle]

these little bugs look exactly like slaters.. used to stomp them dead when I was a kid

[Panda]

these little bugs look exactly like slaters.. used to stomp them dead when I was a kid

I don't see the point of just killing them like that and used to watch them and roll them around when I was a kid. Besides, some people like to eat them, especially marine species (slaters).

http://www.porcellio.scaber.org/woodlice/recipes.htm

There are recipes on this website for woodlice fritters, woodlice sushi, woodlouse scones, and fried woodlice. I've never tried eating these crustaceans and I'm not so sure as to whether or not they carry many parasites, but I doubt that the marine specimens are much different than eating crayfish, crabs, oysters, or many other kinds of crustaceans and they probably have about the same nutritional value. I guess the fact that they are edible would be good to know if you lived in some place like China or were into survivalist things.