Yikes!!! Spider? Cricket? Alien? Help?!?!

[zachnsamsmommy]

We have lots of them. I'm in Tennessee, so they are everywhere. Our water meter girl is hesistant to left meter lids, she told me, b/c they jump up and out when she lifts the cover. Eww...

But my cats love to eat them.

 

[MonkeyDishwasher]

Ick! I don't like it!!! A little while ago (like a few months) I looked on the wall to see a HUGE scary looking bug that looked like a millipede and something else had combined forces. The thing then decided to run off at like 40 MPH. So I did some research and found out that it was a House Centipede.

If you choose to look it up, just be warned, it's just as charming in real life as it is in the pictures! -Ick!-

 

[java]

We had ONE in our house 3 years ago. My Lab freaked out. We didn't know what was scaring her- we look and see THAT Thing! OH it was ugly! really gross and jumped right at us!
Thankfully that's the only one we have ever seen.

 

[irishbosoxfan]

I had only ever seen one prior to moving into this house in October. Since then I have seen about 10 and all of them in my basement.

They say they don't bite but I don't think they know what they're talking about. Here's why...

We smoke outside but when it's cold or raining we go downstairs. One night while it's pouring down outside I head to the cellar and I'm sitting on the steps when I see 3 of the beasts wandering around. At some point earlier a worm had managed to crawl in thru the outside door and had the unfortunate luck of running into one of the sprickets who proceeded to eat him alive.

I kid you not. It ate him.

They also eat each other. DH had stepped on one and we left it there. The alive ones ate on his remains until there wasn't even a stain left on the floor.

I also read that if they're hungry enough they will eat their own legs off.

Not the brightest of ickiness so I don't believe they wouldn't take a bite of me if they hadn't eaten for a while and got the chance.

 

[Jennasis]

We call them cave crickets. Nasty lil' buggers.

 

[gerberdaisy1234]

Yes! We are in Maryland as well and are all too familiar now with the "Spider Cricket" Yuck!!!
We have been here for 2 years now and they still totally freak me out! My husband had one crawling down his back and almost fell down the stairs the other day, and when my brother came to visit, he woke up one morning with something strange looking on his pillowcase. A spider cricket leg! A huge disgusting spider cricket leg. On his pillowcase! Right next to were his mouth was! Guess one came up to cuddle and didn't make it out in one piece! My neighbor swept her kitchen floor the first week she moved here and counted more than 15 legs...no bodies! She stopped counting because neither of us wanted to know how many there really were, and we really, really didn't want to know what happened to the rest of their bodies!
There were no spider crickets in Oregon! Just rain, dungeness crab, wind, and warm lattes!!! (OK..and grumpy fisherman, one armed lumberjacks, and meth labs) But NO spider crickets!!!

I don't know what that is but I am NOT reassured to see that you live in Maryland!!

LOL- I was scared after reading the other Maryland story.

 

[Hillbeans]

Yuck, those things are the scariest looking things....we had them at my parents house growing up and I swear they would jump right at you and follow you if you tried to get away...

One or two visits from the pest control service stopped them from coming back the following year. GROSS!

 

[olena]

Ah yes.....wooly boogers! When they freak out, they shed their legs. We've been battling them for years now and are finally feeling like we're winning. Our exterminator sprays around the baseboards twice a year and whatever he uses works, since we find dead or dying ones. I hate them so much!

Ick! I don't like it!!! A little while ago (like a few months) I looked on the wall to see a HUGE scary looking bug that looked like a millipede and something else had combined forces. The thing then decided to run off at like 40 MPH. So I did some research and found out that it was a House Centipede.

If you choose to look it up, just be warned, it's just as charming in real life as it is in the pictures! -Ick!-

 

[maelstrom]

Um... so where do these things live? I haven't looked at the pictures, but from the descriptions, I don't think that I've seen one before. I live in New York, about an hour north of Manhattan. And we don't have a basement. I have a feeling that if I were to encounter one of these things, I'd have a major panic attack and much crying and hyperventilating would occur.

 

[KSchwagg86]

SPRICKETS!! man those things give me the willies--and we get them in our basement ALL THE TIME!!

 

[JVL1018]

Ack! We had 2 occasions of seeing those crickets this past summer.
I almost had a freaking heart attack when I saw it, I ran upstairs, slammed the basement door and waited until my husband got home. He sprayed it with bug spray and it jumped right at him. I was cowering by the laundry room door and went screeching up the stairs.
DH stepped on it.

A month or so later my son was in playing down in the basement playroom and he came tearing up tellinng me there was a spider down there. I went down with a shoe and saw it was one of those crickets and I left it for my husband. Auugghh! I hope to never see them again, they scare the heck out of me.

We get house centipedes too, down in the basement. HATE THEM, but they are easy to kill at least. They basically disintegrate when you step on them.
I started spraying around the baseboards, and if I remember to do it every couple of weeks, we usually don't get any. They are a summertime problem only for us usually.

 

[LilyWDW]

I once had one sneak into my jeans when I was at my boyfriends (I change into sleepwear when I am there and hang my jeans on the computer chair). Didn't realize it until I was halfway home... while driving... at night. Yea, not a pleasant situation at all. Had to squish it though the pants... it was on my knee at that point. I ended up with a bad scratch from one of it's legs.

Lets just say that I now turn my pants inside out before putting them on.

 

[hrh_disney_queen]

Oh, I hate those things. I am not nervous around most creepy crawlies, but these things JUMP HIGH, and willy-nilly, so you never know where they are going to land. And those long legs give me shivers. I knew exactly what you were talking about and immediately got a shiver up my back.

We used to have a lot of them in our basement in SC. I think in the 5 years here in Savannah I have only seen one.

 

[Liberty Belle]

I HATE cave crickets. In my mind they are not a cricket, but a huge jumping spider. We used to get them in our basement when we lived in an older home. Our washer and dryer were down there and one time I went down to do laundry in a sundress. I came upstairs and thought I felt something on my back and a cave cricket jumped out of my dress!

HATE the things.

 

[gerberdaisy1234]

Disney Queen I had to laugh when I read your tag about knowing what it was...I had to wander if that was a different insect encounter. i guess i should be thankful that is has taken me forty years to see one of these but really i am good with never seeing another. No legs on my pillow, not on my husband's neck or in my daughters bed, not in my jeans, or all the other places you all have found them. I PRAY that I we never find another one in our home again!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[fairestoneofall]

there is one of these who is currently living on my porch. i saw him the other day, but thought he'd gone. he was back tonight. he is completely freaky! yuck!

 

[HugsForEeyore]

You won't like my story. My parent's house has had these crickets since 1987 - 22 years now!! They hop around on the lowest level in the house, sometimes on the second one too (split level house). We put down glue traps every so often, but at this point, we just live with them and accept them. My parents won't exterminate; they don't want poison in the house (mom has had many medical problems, I can understand not wanting to expose her to poisons). So we just let them be basically. If I see one, I just step around it nowadays. I know to always shake my shoes before wearing, since the crickets have be known to hide inside!

Not much we can do to get rid of them - at least they appear to be seasonal. We don't see them much in the winter.

 

[Charitycase20]

I don't know what that is but I am NOT reassured to see that you live in Maryland!!

Me too!!!

 

[JustinsMommy07]

Omg!!!! Thank you for posting this!! Now I know what these things are. (although I didn't look at the pic...the description is perfect) We have these things in our garage(attached to the house) I went out there the other day to get something and this thing jumped right at me I swear it chased me...and they don't really jump in a straight line either!! Do they ever die??? I won't go in the garage again! My husband thinks I'm nuts because I yell at him to close the door behind him when he goes out there. I'm glad I'm not as crazy as I thought.

 

[sbell111]

We used to have those in a house we rented. I did some googling and found this recipe:

1 cup flour
1 small onion, chopped
6 oz Boric Acid
1/4 cup shortening

Blend until crumbly, and then add enough water to moisten. Make marble-sized balls.

I tossed a bunch of these into the crawl space under the house. We no longer had camel crickets.