"Pam Gibbs" wrote in message
...
What a story! Plus now you are the holder of the "Strangest Dorm Pet"
award, having surpassed my friend who kept a duck in his room for three
years.



Well, he wasn't exactly a pet. We just couldn't bring ourselves to throw him
out. You know how college kids are.




" George" wrote in message
...

"Lostin1999" wrote in message
...

"Pam Gibbs" wrote in message
...
We have always had a few small ones around the yard but I just saw one
at
the new pond that was as big as my hand and was hovering in front of
me,
looking me over like hummingbirds do, but way more intimidating than
hummingbirds. So do dragonflies have any method of injuring people?

they CAN bite (I caught one as a child and to get free it bit me (and
drew
blood)), but as a general rule they don't swarm or attack people..

looking back I deserved the bite I got!!!

HTH

Mark


When I was in college many years ago, I was walking down the stairway of
the
dormitory with my roommate, and we stopped at the bottom while my friend
bought
a cola from the vending machines. I sat down on the steps waiting for
him,
placed my hand on the step beside me, and suddenly had this very sharp
pain in
my hand. I pulled my hand away very quickly and looked down. What did I
see?
The largest Praying Mantis I'd ever seen (it must have been five inches
long).
It had it's forelegs reared up like he was going to box me! Man did that
hurt.
He drew blood too.

A few weeks later, one flew into our room, and we kept it as a third
"roommate",
feeding it whatever bugs we could find around. One day, I was laying on
my bed
reading a text book when it flew all the way across the room and landed on
top
of the tone arm of the turntable of my stereo. I don't remember what I
was
listening to, but I had a record playing at the time. The Mantis stood
there
unmoving on top of the tone arm for the longest time. I was amazed that
it
didn't make the record skip. As I watched, I noticed that there was a
moth at
the top of the mirror behind the stereo. After what seemed forever, the
Mantis
slowly crept down from the tone arm and got a huge surprise when he
stepped onto
the turning record. His upper body (thorax) weaved in circles really fast
while
he tried to keep his balance on the turning record. When he almost
reached the
other side of the tonearm (the hard way), he jumped off of the back of the
stereo, and landed on the book shelf. After a few minutes, he slowly
crept up
the mirror, going after the moth. He got to within an inch of it, and
stopped
for a long time. Right when he was about to pounce on it (he reminded me
of a
cat ready to pounce on a string), the moth flew off. He looked so
dejected, I
but I had to laugh. It was the coolest thing I'd ever seen an insect do.
True
story.