Insects and other nasty things

The rainy season brings out the insects. Not just the mosquitoes, although those are certainly plentiful at the moment, but other things too. This morning I found a centipede on the wall in my hall (OK, not an insect, I know). Thankfully I found out recently, during my Kenya holiday, that these things have a bite/sting so painful that grown men can roll around on the floor screaming in agony, so it was very quickly squashed.

Last weekend I found this nasty-looking insect building its little mud nest in my kitchen (little nests that rapidly grow to enormous nests). I called my maid, Gloria, over and asked her to deal with it, and she smashed the nest into pieces. Before she threw them away however I asked to take a look, wondering if there had been anything inside the little mud tunnels. & this was what I saw.


Ten dead spiders, at least! Plus what I guess was the insect larvae, just under the lime green spider in the front of the picture. I wondered then, given my dislike of spiders, whether I was doing the right thing by discouraging it from nesting in my house. But it did look as though it could give a nasty sting, as I said to Gloria. She replied that they are completely harmless. I felt momentarily guilty, but then again I really wouldn’t feel comfortable with an insect like that hovering around me, despite its wonderful spider-removing capacity.