I was born and brought-up in the opposite corner of England from that I now inhabit - in the South West. And, even though England is a small nation, there are differences in the animals perceptible across its length and breadth.
In childhood, there was a fear of red ants and earwigs - but we don't see these in the North East (or, only very rarely).
We were afraid of earwigs in case the pincers at the back might be able to nip us*; and red ants were (although tiny) supposed to be keen on biting or stinging (I was never sure which).
My instinctive response was to kill these beasts at every opportunity - which is rational; although some of the ways that I killed them entailed a deplorable mixture of curiosity and sadism.
Anyway, I had been living up here for many years before I realized that I hadn't seen any earwigs or red ants for ages; whereas in Somerset you just had to sit down on some grass and they would come swarming - or so recollection informs.
I hated them, but I sort-of miss them.
(Same with Starlings.)
Thus nature balances itself...
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*We also vied to spook each other with stories about how "a man" once had an earwig crawl into his ear, and "they" couldn't get it out, and it ate through into his brain, and made a nest which was only discovered after he was dead and "they" cut his head open. Or something.
2 comments:
I also grew up with lots of red ants, earwigs, and starlings, and now live in a place that lacks them.
We used to call rove beetles "antwigs," convinced they were the chimeric offspring of these two dreaded insects.
Nowadays, I would expect young kids to be terrified of the invasive Asian ladybird (aka ladybug) larvae - they look really mean.
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