Colorchallenge: Tuesday Orange

Terrific Tuesday, Folks!

This is a camper’s nightmare. Sometimes they invade your home. Especially, if you build your house on land previously used for sugarcane farming. Scolopendra subspinipes, or Vietnamese centipede, is the only one to be feared of the three species in Hawaii. The other two are small and harmless. These arthropods are quite strong.

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They occasionally turn up in my yard and I admit to finding them fascinating. The one pictured below was mostly dead. They come out to hunt at night. During the day you can find them hiding in damp areas; e.g., under leaves and stones.

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Under the head, you can find the forcipules which are modified legs use for subduing prey or for defense. They are filled with venom and the pinching motion makes them quite effective. I once sat on a few tiny, baby centipedes and even those pack a punch.

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I made one as an art piece. I call it Night Stalker. It is made from bronze and copper metal clay and is articulated at the segments.

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Photos by the author in Honolulu.



I am a red man.
If the Great Spirit had desired me to be a white man
he would have made me so in the first place.

-Sitting Bull


Mahalo in advance for any looks, upvotes, follows, or comments;
I appreciate it.

My introduction to metal clay post:
https://steemit.com/art/@lightrhythm/what-is-metal-clay-a-short-introduction


My colorchallenge from yesterday:
https://steemit.com/colorchallenge/@lightrhythm/aw1mb-colorchallenge-monday-red

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The centipedes your showing in the pics: are those average size? Or are they some of the larger specimen? Those things look MEAN!

And the metal centipede you made is really cool! Do you make other sculptures?

I think they look larger in the pics but they can get quite a bit larger. They not to be messed with but I still do, lol. Thanks! I do make other small scale sculpture. I have some pics posted on my header link to my flickr account.

What an interesting creature and what a fabulous bronze and copper creation!

Is it true that those are the only venomous creature in Hawaii (ie no snakes or spiders?) Also, your bronze version is way cool!

That is not true, unfortunately. We have black and brown widows, scorpions, bees and wasps, stinging ants and caterpillars, venomous fishes and sea mollusks, and jellyfishes. Luckily we don't have venomous terrestrial snakes but we do have a highly venomous sea snake, though extremely rare. Actually, you can go many days without encountering any of these things :)

wow I was way off

Having those guys in your garden means that wearing gloves is very important, right? We have mostly black and brown widow spiders which can be bad news if they bite you. some have Skorpion problems but so far, we have been lucky. Rattlesnakes are also common when the property backs up to a wilderness area. So far, so good.
Your art piece is stunning! Are you selling your art?

Actually, I don't encounter them often. Some people have more infestation type issues. So for them it is a different experience. We have those spiders and scorpions also but not too many where I live. The islands are actively trying to avoid a snake problem so we are vigilant about keeping them out. However, we do have tiny blind snakes that are only the size of worms. We supposedly have sea snakes but I've never seen one. Thanks! I am not actively selling now however I do the occasional gallery art show and sell things there. Mahalo for visiting :)

keeping snakes out is a good idea. They are native to California, but Florida is having a huge problem with imported snakes becoming wild - reproducing like crazy since they don't have natural predators and wiping out populations of native animals...

Yeah, they decimated the bird population in Guam so we didn't want that to happen here. Still, people try to smuggle them in or let their pets go :(

"It's just one snake I'm letting free..." say 1000 snake owners...

Yeah, those small acts can become ecological nightmares. Unfortunately a lot of damage has already been done from past introductions.

Yup. so irresponsible . People do that with pets all the time.

huy dios mio eso se ve tenebroso,, no quiero saber su picadura.
me da escalofrío

No need to be scared. They only bite with they feel threatened :)

wowww very wild picture. great post. upvote and follow you. thank you

Feel free to view a cute orange butterfly:
https://steemit.com/colorchallenge/@keybelle/colorchallenge-today-orange-butterfly-big-close-up

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Very cool post, and I really like the art piece at the end. It is awesome that you were able to make it articulated! Just skimming through your page, it looks like you have a lot of cool content. FOLLOWED & RESTEEMED!

Mahalo! I am following you already. Thanks for the visit!

Wowwwww! Great post!

Thanks for visiting :)

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