Random Grossest Bugs on Earth (14 items)

• 

  (#2) Cave Spider

  Also known as the Tailless Whip Scorpion, this is neither a spider nor a scorpion. But it sure the @$#%#$% is terrifying.
• 

  (#10) Assassin Bug

  Imagine something that has a needle on its face. It injects poison with the needle, and then sucks the liquified victim's insides back in through the same needle. Now imagine that thing is real. Because it is.

  That's pretty gross, but they start young. When they are little, some species will cover and camouflage themselves with remains of dead prey insects, which forms a very effective camouflage. How's that for cold? Wearing a suit made of your dead victims? Some species are blood suckers rather than predators, and they are accordingly far less welcome. Some Assassin bugs are known as kissing bugs because of this, because they tend to bite sleeping humans in the soft tissue around the lips and eyes. 

  In some crazier parts of the world, people BREED them as PETS and for pest control. Jesus, get a fish.
• 

  (#11) Palmetto Bug

  This is basically a cockroach. It looks just like it, but when I lived in Miami, these things weren't content to lurk in corners. They would come out onto the walls, and they would FLY. Yes, these are larger-than-normal cockroaches. That can fly. So they are definitely making this list. 

  
  

  Flying. Giant. Cockroaches.
• 

  (#6) Cattle Tick

  Oh jeez. This list is seriously making me gag. Ticks are bad enough, their whole nasty family of bloodsucking disease-carriers... but Cattle Ticks? If any of you have ever spent any time around livestock, you know what I mean. Horses, sheep and cattle... you'll be walking by or maybe grooming a horse and GAAAAHHHH! It's the size of a grape. A GRAPE! and it's all white and giant, and filled with blood. 

  And you have to get some horseshoe tongs or something and pull it off and... ok, I'm totally traumatized now. This is why I am not living on a ranch right now, people. 
• 

  (#5) Cockroach

  • Order

  Hey! Everyone loves cockroaches! What are they doing on this list? All filthy and skittering and impossible to smash. Hiding in dark corners and swarming on all their gross hairy legs. In our KITCHEN! Where the food is!

  Yes. This is the king of gross, this thing. I love bugs, and I can't STAND these things.

   

  They are FAST.  I mean, they should be impressive if they weren't so nasty. They've been clocked at 3.4 mph, about 50 body lengths per second, which would be is like a human running 210 mph. They are adaptative and ridiculously bulletproof. The myth about them surviving radiation is no myth.  
• 

  (#9) Earwig

  • Organism Classification

  There must be something about a shiny carapace, right? Or maybe it's those little moving pincher things on the butt, which they use to capture and hold prey.

  Their gross name may be related to the old wives' tale that earwigs burrowed into the brains of humans through the ear and laid their eggs there. Earwigs like hiding in warm humid crevices and I suppose nothing is stopping thrm from occasionally crawling into the human ear canal (much like any other small organism). Not that I've ever heard of something like that happening. (Though a spider did once crawl into mom's ear when she was sleeping. I know. I didn't sleep for a week after that.)

  Earwigs can also do that cockroach thing and get all flat to fit into the tiniest places you could ever imagine. Barf.

New Random Displays    Display All By Ranking