In other news, how did this species survive this long? In the 2 minutes I was out there it spent the entire time in a 1 sq ft area, first stuck on a brier plant, then in spider webs, and finally on a cleaver plant. If it ever managed to free itself, the goal was obviously to fly headlong into my flashlight. Perhaps they have lots of offspring to make up for their lack of acumen.

I name alot of things~ it keeps it interesting. …Bugs, mice, deer, woodchucks, rabbits, stray cats… In my defense, I didn’t know what the camel crickets were called at the time, so I chose a name to call them (George). Randy always tells me I’m going to run out of names one day…

We’ve had so many more bugs inside than just Georges… Let’s see – last autumn there were thousands of ladybugs all over the walls of one side of the house. I wouldn’t let Randy kill them, so we captured them in jars & took them way down the street & let them go… There’s always some kind of bug or critter (squirrels, mice, lizards, etc.) that gets inside & risks attack by Jack. And no, I do not want any house centipedes, thank you!

Also, very funny story about the Georges. I’ve never heard of someone naming their insect pests before. I looked up your camel crickets. We used to spray to kill bugs indoors in Phoenix, but we don’t plan to do that here. Not sure what I would do if we were overrun with camel crickets. Wikipedia suggests that you can release house centipedes to kill them (and pretty much everything else too it seems), but that would be trading one bug for an even scarier looking one! Much better to have a Jack, even if you do end up with George legs laying about.

Rachael – The information on the Ten-Lined June Beetle (they eat pin needles, not mice by the way) says they squeak or hiss if you touch them. I’m glad I didn’t know this when I took the photo. I would have felt obligated to pick it up for the sake of scientific curiosity.

Rachael- Thankfully it was outside. It was the most amazingly big beetle I have ever seen.