Post by Jembru on Mar 21, 2015 12:41:16 GMT
I should really be doing this in the Japanese section because it's a topic I'm quite passionate about so would be great practice. I need to go to bed soon though and it takes me almost twice as long to write in Japanese. If someone were to start a wildlife thread there though... 
So I was just going off-topic about insects in Japan in another thread, so I'll kick off with that.
Where I lived in Kanagawa was fairly green with lots of bamboo woodlands and large deciduous woods around too. There was one woodland in particular adjoining Ikuta park that I used to love to walk through and sit in (until in summer I had to stop going because of the number of giant hornets that I was pretty freaked out by). It felt like an enchanted forest to me, maybe because the flora was so different to that found in the British forests I'm used to. The sense of wonder was made all the stronger when on the night of the Summer Solstice, an already spiritually significant day for me, they released fireflies into a section of that wood. It was so beautiful, like little fairies. One of my friends was able to catch one in her hand. I'd seen fireflies once before, when on holiday in the South of France as a child, but I'd never seen one close up before. It is such a fond memory.
When I think of Japan, I think of insects. Apparently if you live in or near to the center of Tokyo you can almost entirely avoid them, but they were a daily fixture for me.
I was obsessed with gejigeji. I'd never seen anything like it. I remember I was returning home from work one evening after doing the late shift. As per my usual routine, I stopped off at the Odakyu Ox and picked up a 3 stack of natto, a fruit salad and 2 cans of chu-hi (apple of course.. although I've heard they discontinued the apple one recently.. Kirin is dead to me!!). Ikuta, like much of suburban Japan, is very hilly, so I had 2 steep sets of steps to climb between the station and my street. These steps weren't very well lit at night and it was a little unnerving sometimes. In the dim light, I suddenly saw a creature scurry across a step. It seemed to be about 4 inches long and moved very fast. I wondered if it were a tiny mouse and hurried over to the shadow where it had gone. I used my phone as a torch and almost dropped it with surprise when I saw the creature illuminated before me. I did 3 years of zoology at university and my uni had a very prominent entomology department. Heck, even my field study in my final year was on the mating behaviour of the yellow dung fly (I think my name appears in a journal somewhere because my data was used, but I've never checked, I just remember being asked for permission to use the data). So the fact that my knowledge of arthropods was so bad, was a bit embarrassing.
I described the creature to some Japanese students the following day, something I frequently did in fact, and they told me it was a 'gejigeji'. I started seeing them fairly often after that, and I always tried to take a photograph. I never managed though. I would draw them a lot though, trying to sketch them from memory. These days I'm more Internet savvy, so I can just google the little critters if I want to see them again. For those who don't know what a house centipede is, or only know the smaller brown-ish ones you apparently get in some parts of North America.. then here is a Japanese gejigeji:
The other thing I want to talk about before I sign off, is mukade, or the giant centipedes. Mukade just means centipede and Japan has many species, but if you say 'mukade' people think of just one thing; a blue-bodied, red-legged 6-inch monster that plagued my existence in Japan. They were everywhere, and some were huge.
On the same night I saw the fireflies, there was one in the ladies toilets and it spanned 3 floor tiles, even with it's head curved to the side. It must have been 10 inches long at least and was by far the largest I saw. They are exceptionally fast and will be perfectly still one moment, then suddenly lunge into full sprint. Oh and I forgot to mention, their venom is strong enough to affect humans. Their bite is painful and you are likely to experience swelling and sickness. In some cases, people can die from their bite if they don't go to hospital. Not nice at all considering these things like to creep into your home..
Unfortunately, they made me scared of all centipedes, even though the ones here are tiny by comparison. I'd never harm one, but I really don't like them and I won't do gardening any more, even though I used to love it. It's crazy.. I have no issue with spiders, but put me near a centipede and I'll freak out.
So I was just going off-topic about insects in Japan in another thread, so I'll kick off with that.
Where I lived in Kanagawa was fairly green with lots of bamboo woodlands and large deciduous woods around too. There was one woodland in particular adjoining Ikuta park that I used to love to walk through and sit in (until in summer I had to stop going because of the number of giant hornets that I was pretty freaked out by). It felt like an enchanted forest to me, maybe because the flora was so different to that found in the British forests I'm used to. The sense of wonder was made all the stronger when on the night of the Summer Solstice, an already spiritually significant day for me, they released fireflies into a section of that wood. It was so beautiful, like little fairies. One of my friends was able to catch one in her hand. I'd seen fireflies once before, when on holiday in the South of France as a child, but I'd never seen one close up before. It is such a fond memory.
When I think of Japan, I think of insects. Apparently if you live in or near to the center of Tokyo you can almost entirely avoid them, but they were a daily fixture for me.
I was obsessed with gejigeji. I'd never seen anything like it. I remember I was returning home from work one evening after doing the late shift. As per my usual routine, I stopped off at the Odakyu Ox and picked up a 3 stack of natto, a fruit salad and 2 cans of chu-hi (apple of course.. although I've heard they discontinued the apple one recently.. Kirin is dead to me!!). Ikuta, like much of suburban Japan, is very hilly, so I had 2 steep sets of steps to climb between the station and my street. These steps weren't very well lit at night and it was a little unnerving sometimes. In the dim light, I suddenly saw a creature scurry across a step. It seemed to be about 4 inches long and moved very fast. I wondered if it were a tiny mouse and hurried over to the shadow where it had gone. I used my phone as a torch and almost dropped it with surprise when I saw the creature illuminated before me. I did 3 years of zoology at university and my uni had a very prominent entomology department. Heck, even my field study in my final year was on the mating behaviour of the yellow dung fly (I think my name appears in a journal somewhere because my data was used, but I've never checked, I just remember being asked for permission to use the data). So the fact that my knowledge of arthropods was so bad, was a bit embarrassing.
I described the creature to some Japanese students the following day, something I frequently did in fact, and they told me it was a 'gejigeji'. I started seeing them fairly often after that, and I always tried to take a photograph. I never managed though. I would draw them a lot though, trying to sketch them from memory. These days I'm more Internet savvy, so I can just google the little critters if I want to see them again. For those who don't know what a house centipede is, or only know the smaller brown-ish ones you apparently get in some parts of North America.. then here is a Japanese gejigeji:
The other thing I want to talk about before I sign off, is mukade, or the giant centipedes. Mukade just means centipede and Japan has many species, but if you say 'mukade' people think of just one thing; a blue-bodied, red-legged 6-inch monster that plagued my existence in Japan. They were everywhere, and some were huge.
On the same night I saw the fireflies, there was one in the ladies toilets and it spanned 3 floor tiles, even with it's head curved to the side. It must have been 10 inches long at least and was by far the largest I saw. They are exceptionally fast and will be perfectly still one moment, then suddenly lunge into full sprint. Oh and I forgot to mention, their venom is strong enough to affect humans. Their bite is painful and you are likely to experience swelling and sickness. In some cases, people can die from their bite if they don't go to hospital. Not nice at all considering these things like to creep into your home..
Unfortunately, they made me scared of all centipedes, even though the ones here are tiny by comparison. I'd never harm one, but I really don't like them and I won't do gardening any more, even though I used to love it. It's crazy.. I have no issue with spiders, but put me near a centipede and I'll freak out.
I guess they didn't know that raccoons are one of the biggest carriers of rabies in the US. (Seriously. When I was little & used to play in the woods, I was always warned to never go near dazed-looking raccoons walking around in the daytime, because they likely had rabies & could bite)