Every time I lift anything in the garden at least when the thing is resting on a hard surface I see lots of wood lice scuttling away. Are the harmful or friendly?
I also manage to get them into my compost bins when I am depositing handfuls of cut grass which I had previously scraped from my rotating mower and left to dry out.

In article b6537c6a01e8feaaa4a4aaa81514de73@TeraNews, andrew writes:
| Every time I lift anything in the garden at least when the thing is
| resting on a hard surface I see lots of wood lice scuttling away. Are
| the harmful or friendly?
| I also manage to get them into my compost bins when I am depositing
| handfuls of cut grass which I had previously scraped from my rotating
| mower and left to dry out.

They are harmless scavengers on rotting vegetation, and should be
ignored. They are crustaceans, and can be eaten, incidentally;
please tell us if you summon up the courage to try! They VERY,
VERY rarely damage seedlings, but it can happen.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

In article , Nick Maclaren
writes

In article b6537c6a01e8feaaa4a4aaa81514de73@TeraNews, andrew
writes:
| Every time I lift anything in the garden at least when the thing is
| resting on a hard surface I see lots of wood lice scuttling away. Are
| the harmful or friendly?
| I also manage to get them into my compost bins when I am depositing
| handfuls of cut grass which I had previously scraped from my rotating
| mower and left to dry out.

They are harmless scavengers on rotting vegetation, and should be
ignored. They are crustaceans, and can be eaten, incidentally;
please tell us if you summon up the courage to try! They VERY,
VERY rarely damage seedlings, but it can happen.

They can also damage stored fruit and vegetables though that will only
happen if the storage area is damp as they can't survive in dry
conditions. They will happily chew at damp newspaper so if the fruit,
say, are wrapped in newspaper this could increase the (fairly slight)
risk of damage.

As for eating them, well they are crustaceans and so related to lobsters
and prawns, but whether they taste similar I'm not about to find out!

--
Malcolm

"Malcolm" wrote in message
...

They can also damage stored fruit and vegetables though that will only
happen if the storage area is damp as they can't survive in dry
conditions. They will happily chew at damp newspaper so if the fruit,
say, are wrapped in newspaper this could increase the (fairly slight)
risk of damage.

As for eating them, well they are crustaceans and so related to lobsters
and prawns, but whether they taste similar I'm not about to find out!

Are terrestrial crustacea going to have ionic regulation like a freshwater
or a marine crustacean? Obviously, this is going t govern what they taste
like (hence the relative blandness of a crayfish nesxt to, say, a prawn).

Do people eat any crustacea that aren't decapoda?

On Wed, 28 May 2003 14:50:40 +0100, Colin Davidson
wrote:


"Malcolm" wrote in message
...

They can also damage stored fruit and vegetables though that will only
happen if the storage area is damp as they can't survive in dry
conditions. They will happily chew at damp newspaper so if the fruit,
say, are wrapped in newspaper this could increase the (fairly slight)
risk of damage.

As for eating them, well they are crustaceans and so related to lobsters
and prawns, but whether they taste similar I'm not about to find out!

Are terrestrial crustacea going to have ionic regulation like a
freshwater
or a marine crustacean? Obviously, this is going t govern what they taste
like (hence the relative blandness of a crayfish nesxt to, say, a prawn).

Do people eat any crustacea that aren't decapoda?


I think some barnacles are eaten.
TIm.

In article ,
Malcolm writes:
|
| They can also damage stored fruit and vegetables though that will only
| happen if the storage area is damp as they can't survive in dry
| conditions. They will happily chew at damp newspaper so if the fruit,
| say, are wrapped in newspaper this could increase the (fairly slight)
| risk of damage.

I am not sure about this. If their mouth parts aren't powerful
enough to damage anything except the most delicate seedlings, it
seems a bit doubtful that they could cause the initial damage to
stored fruit and vegetables. They will certainly follow initial
damage caused by mice, rot or whatever, but I suspect that they
are getting blamed unfairly for being the cause.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

In article , Colin Davidson
writes

"Malcolm" wrote in message
...

They can also damage stored fruit and vegetables though that will only
happen if the storage area is damp as they can't survive in dry
conditions. They will happily chew at damp newspaper so if the fruit,
say, are wrapped in newspaper this could increase the (fairly slight)
risk of damage.

As for eating them, well they are crustaceans and so related to lobsters
and prawns, but whether they taste similar I'm not about to find out!

Are terrestrial crustacea going to have ionic regulation like a freshwater
or a marine crustacean? Obviously, this is going t govern what they taste
like (hence the relative blandness of a crayfish nesxt to, say, a prawn).

Get testing :-)

Do people eat any crustacea that aren't decapoda?

I don't know. I suppose one could eat both barnacles and goose-barnacles
at a pinch!

--
Malcolm

In article ,
Malcolm writes:
| In article , Colin Davidson
| writes
|
| Do people eat any crustacea that aren't decapoda?
|
| I don't know. I suppose one could eat both barnacles and goose-barnacles
| at a pinch!

Goose barnacles are fairly widely eaten - e.g. in Spain. It is
hard to make rock-gathered mussel or limpet soup and not include
some barnacles!


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

"andrew" wrote in message
news:b6537c6a01e8feaaa4a4aaa81514de73@TeraNews...
Every time I lift anything in the garden at least when the thing is
resting on a hard surface I see lots of wood lice scuttling away. Are
the harmful or friendly?
I also manage to get them into my compost bins when I am depositing
handfuls of cut grass which I had previously scraped from my rotating
mower and left to dry out.
--
andrew
andrew bebb
------------------------------------------------------------------------

As I have caught them eating dahlia flowers in my greenhouse, I regard them
as pests.

Bevan

"Bevan Price" wrote in message
...

"andrew" wrote in message
news:b6537c6a01e8feaaa4a4aaa81514de73@TeraNews...
Every time I lift anything in the garden at least when the thing is
resting on a hard surface I see lots of wood lice scuttling away. Are
the harmful or friendly?
I also manage to get them into my compost bins when I am depositing
handfuls of cut grass which I had previously scraped from my rotating
mower and left to dry out.
--
andrew
andrew bebb
------------------------------------------------------------------------

As I have caught them eating dahlia flowers in my greenhouse, I regard
them
as pests.

If I had dahlias in my garden I'd regard them as weeds.

The hens seem to have eaten all the woodlice in our garden, I never see them
these days. I must ask what they tasted like.

Mary

Bevan

Nick Maclaren wrote:

[Wood Lice]

: They are crustaceans, and can be eaten, incidentally;
: please tell us if you summon up the courage to try!

Note the way they roll up into little balls - it's nature's way of
making them easier to swallow ;-)
--
__________
|im |yler http://timtyler.org/

"Bevan Price" wrote in message
...

"andrew" wrote in message
news:b6537c6a01e8feaaa4a4aaa81514de73@TeraNews...
Every time I lift anything in the garden at least when the thing is
resting on a hard surface I see lots of wood lice scuttling away. Are
the harmful or friendly?
I also manage to get them into my compost bins when I am depositing
handfuls of cut grass which I had previously scraped from my rotating
mower and left to dry out.
--
andrew
andrew bebb
------------------------------------------------------------------------

As I have caught them eating dahlia flowers in my greenhouse, I regard
them
as pests.


Me too. I went out in the evening to try to find what was eating holes in
the flower stems of my lupins and caught them at it. *******s.

Steve

In article ,
"shazzbat" writes:
|
| As I have caught them eating dahlia flowers in my greenhouse, I regard
| them
| as pests.
|
| Me too. I went out in the evening to try to find what was eating holes in
| the flower stems of my lupins and caught them at it. *******s.

Don't jump to conclusions. It is unlikely that they were the cause
of the damage unless your lupins were VERY soft stemmed. What
probably happened was that something else damaged the stems first,
and the woodlice followed on afterwards.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.