# When nature grosses you out **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 12, 2007, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612 "2007-03-12T15:48:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Harmonious\_Discord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/74df32/32.png) [@Harmonious\_Discord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harmonious_Discord)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2007, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/161 "2007-03-16T15:33:26Z")
[QUOTE=Maastricht] Oh, why not collect the whole set? There’s a little innocent looking plant, [Chenopodium vulvaria,](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chenopodium_vulvaria) which gets it name from smelling like an unwashed … well, you get it. 🙂 I smelled one once, and the plant is aptly named. [/QUOTE] I invision a garden filled with stinky plants that smell like sex, and featured at a botanical garden. Yuck. I know they would have visitors too, all looking for bragging rights. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2007, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/162 "2007-03-16T16:13:57Z")
[QUOTE=Arnold Winkelried] The animals that creep me out the most are the parasites that alter the host’s behaviour. [/QUOTE] Yeah, that was what creeps me out most about the snail trematode I linked to - apparently, it will make the snail head for the highest visible place so that it is more visible to the birds that will rip its pulsating wormy tentacle off. Oh, and [these guys](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_isopod) are cuddly. I loved when the webcomic\* indietits\* had one as a guest star. ---
**Author:** ![Beaucarnea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c0e974/32.png) [@Beaucarnea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beaucarnea)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2007, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/163 "2007-03-16T16:16:59Z")
[QUOTE=Harmonious Discord] I invision a garden filled with stinky plants that smell like sex, and featured at a botanical garden. Yuck. I know they would have visitors too, all looking for bragging rights. [/QUOTE] Confession: I have a _vulgar garden_. When it blooms this summer, I will enclose pics. It is full of [calla lillies](http://images.google.com/images?q=calla+lily&hl=en&um=1&sa=X&oi=images&ct=title) ,[peter peppers.](http://images.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&q=peter+pepper), and [clitoria](http://images.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&q=clitoria). It is planted around my front door, and visitors take note, look perplexed, then choose to say nothing. Cracks me up. ---
**Author:** ![Solfy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@Solfy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Solfy)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2007, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/164 "2007-03-16T16:37:48Z")
On the subject of parasites exerting mind control, I recently came across a video of [this charming fungus](http://neurophilosophy.wordpress.com/2006/11/20/brainwashed-by-a-parasite/) that makes ants crawl to high places and clamp on. The fungus then eats the ant’s brain and sends a fruting body out of its head. I am glad I’m not an ant. ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2007, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/165 "2007-03-16T16:45:04Z")
[QUOTE=Cervaise] You don’t know how tempting it is to post a link labeled “another webbed-up bicycle” that doesn’t, y’know, go to a webbed-up bicycle. 😉 [/QUOTE] Note to self…view future **Cervaise** Links with a very skeptical eye. (Hey…at least you warned me.) ---
**Author:** ![Chum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3ab097/32.png) [@Chum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chum)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2007, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/166 "2007-03-17T03:28:59Z")
I’ve clicked most of the links and have not been severely grossed out. I even looked up that video of the horse abcess and mostly thought it was cool (and felt bad for the horse). I think caterpillars and worms are cool. That potato bug is really cute. The surinam toad is fascinating. Silverfish are a little bit icky in the way they slither around, but it’s pretty neat how when you squish one with some toilet paper it just turns into dust. I think I’d be _freaked_ out if I saw some of these things in person (like the vinegaroon - which doesn’t look that much scarier than a scorpion, IMO), but they don’t _gross_ me out. Freakiness and grossness are different. I’m freaked out by feeling bugs crawl on me, but I don’t really think they’re gross. I’m super freaked out by things that could bite or sting me, but I don’t think they’re gross - I think they’re mean. Gross, to me, are dead/decaying animals. But clean skeletons aren’t gross. I don’t think I’d be grossed out if I saw a maggot hanging out on a leaf or something, but I’d _definitely_ be grossed out if I saw a million of them munching on a dead animal. Or on a living person’s leg (even though I think the idea of using them for treatment is pretty nifty). Dog puke is also pretty gross. So is dog poop, especially when you have to pick up a hundred piles of it after spring thaw. Maybe I’m just grossed out by things that smell nasty. But I think I’d be intrigued by those plants that smell like sex, so who knows. ---
**Author:** ![Harmonious\_Discord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/74df32/32.png) [@Harmonious\_Discord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harmonious_Discord)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2007, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/167 "2007-03-17T20:32:54Z")
[QUOTE=Beaucarnea] Confession: I have a _vulgar garden_. When it blooms this summer, I will enclose pics. It is full of [calla lillies](http://images.google.com/images?q=calla+lily&hl=en&um=1&sa=X&oi=images&ct=title) ,[peter peppers.](http://images.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&q=peter+pepper), and [clitoria](http://images.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&q=clitoria). It is planted around my front door, and visitors take note, look perplexed, then choose to say nothing. Cracks me up. [/QUOTE] I can ignore any indecent resemblance in all except the Peter Peppers. You can’t ignore that, but it’s phalic not gross. Here’s the phalic Dog Stinkhorn and the Clathrus. [Fungus link](http://botit.botany.wisc.edu/toms_fungi/oct2006.html) Chum you reminded me of something else gross. [Slime mold.](http://plant_doctor.typepad.com/the_seasoned_gardener/2006/08/dont_blame_the_.html) ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2007, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/168 "2007-03-18T03:57:58Z")
[QUOTE=Beaucarnea] Confession: I have a _vulgar garden_. When it blooms this summer, I will enclose pics. It is full of [calla lillies](http://images.google.com/images?q=calla+lily&hl=en&um=1&sa=X&oi=images&ct=title) ,[peter peppers.](http://images.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&q=peter+pepper), and [clitoria](http://images.google.com/images?svnum=10&hl=en&q=clitoria). It is planted around my front door, and visitors take note, look perplexed, then choose to say nothing. Cracks me up. [/QUOTE] Well, at least two of those _are_ actually sex organs. And I think calla lilies are shamelessly-beautiful. The peter peppers, though? _snicker_ Some of the other things in this thread though… :: shudder :: The worst things I have encountered in person, though: a) Taking stuff to the compost bin at a place where they composted meat. The smell was pretty bad, but then I opened the lid. “Hmm. I don’t remember having rice in the past couple of days. Wait a minute… it’s moving. _That’s not rice!_” :: dump :: :: slam :: :: run :: b) Scene: a rocky hill on a peninsula in the Pacific, just offshore of the beach in Long Beach Provincial Park on Vancouver Island. It’s joined to the beach by a sandy spit. My best friend at the time and I are camping on the beach, and we decide to go exploring on this island. We start climbing the cliff. Then: _squish_ I’d _stepped_ on a banana slug. Banana slugs live in the rainforest, start at about the diameter of your thumb, and look like overripe bananas. I almost fell off the cliff because the slug guts lubricated my footing. :: ick :: :: ick :: Then there are catalpa trees. My grandmother had one growing on her front lawn in Peterborough, Ontario. They have gorgeous flowers that look like chandeliers. Some time later, though, come the seed pods: long thin things the diameter of your little finger. They look like _completely_-overripe bananas, dangle down, catch in your hair. (Inflatable Cow: band name! I would have thrown a rock at it as well. But dear Og, the poor guy.) ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2007, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/169 "2007-03-18T04:30:55Z")
[Under no circumstances whatsoever do you want to click this link](http://youtube.com/watch?v=8CL2hetqpfg). ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2007, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/170 "2007-03-18T06:43:53Z")
[QUOTE=Cervaise] [Under no circumstances whatsoever do you want to click this link](http://youtube.com/watch?v=8CL2hetqpfg). [/QUOTE] See, now that’s actually kind of cool. No disgusting slimy rotty stuff. And around 3:54, when you can see the mouse’s jawbone start to emerge, it’s clear that the centipede is really scarfing stuff down… ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2007, 6:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/171 "2007-03-18T06:58:45Z")
[QUOTE=Tupug Anachi] [Lotus seed pods](http://www.flickr.com/photos/petrichor/86300181/) ever since I saw the “breast rash” thing at Snopes. UNGHHH!! [/QUOTE] I think I ate something that looked like a slice of that at a Korean restaurant in Newmarket once. I was expecting slimy, but it was actually crunchy and pretty tasty. If you got over the looks. ---
**Author:** ![Harmonious\_Discord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/74df32/32.png) [@Harmonious\_Discord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harmonious_Discord)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2007, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/172 "2007-03-18T13:13:22Z")
The catalpa pods are about 1.5 feet long on the trees I’ve seen, and dangerous. They have a super strong structure, and can fall from the great heights like a Jart. I can imagine them go through the soft spot in the skull of an adolesent easily. Also don’t look up or you’ll poke your eye out. Being from Wisconsin I can’t let this go. Steers are male cattle with a schlong and not nuts. A cow is not and can’t be even if it loses it’s utters. I checked the spelling of schlong. I should have known it was derived from the Germanic word for snake. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2007, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/173 "2007-03-18T15:06:59Z")
[QUOTE=Harmonious Discord] \A cow is not and can’t be even if it loses it’s utters. I checked the spelling of schlong. \ [/QUOTE] But not udders. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Harmonious\_Discord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/74df32/32.png) [@Harmonious\_Discord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harmonious_Discord)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2007, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/174 "2007-03-18T21:40:54Z")
[QUOTE=featherlou] But not udders. 😃 [/QUOTE] You want I should do both! ---
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2007, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/175 "2007-03-18T21:58:33Z")
[QUOTE=Sunspace] I think I ate something that looked like a slice of that at a Korean restaurant in Newmarket once. I was expecting slimy, but it was actually crunchy and pretty tasty. If you got over the looks. [/QUOTE] You were probably eating a slice of lotus _root_, which is popular in Asian cooking. You’re right, they are pretty tasty - kind of crunchy and starchy. And they have a pretty pattern of lacy holes running the length of the tuber. The lotus seed pod upthread is another thing. They never bothered me before, but after reading this thread, now I’ll always associate them with the tadpole-holes on a Surinam Toad’s back. Thanks, guys! ---
**Author:** ![Wile\_E](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c37758/32.png) [@Wile\_E](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wile_E)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2007, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/176 "2007-03-18T22:36:07Z")
Has this been mentioned yet? I just remembered Dioctophyma renale, the [giant kidney worm](http://cal.vet.upenn.edu/paraav/images/kidneywm.jpg). It’s the largest nematode parasite of domestic animals and in rare cases can infect humans. When it develops in its host it completely takes over one kidney (most often the right one) so that all that is left is the shell of the kidney with the giant worm curled up in it. We learned how to identify the parasite egg in urine but I’ve seen it only once in 24 years, it was a long time ago. Since the patient was seen on emergency and went elsewhere for follow-up I never heard if they removed the kidney or euthanized the animal. [QUOTE=Dung Beetle] People, _please!_ I am trying to eat some Cadbury creme eggs here! [/QUOTE] Okay, now that’s digusting. I can’t stand those things. They look gross and they taste like all the sugar in the world were compressed into it. Sugar = good, all the sugar in the world in one bite = bad. I normally wouldn’t have even tasted it but my mother kept getting them for me for Easter despite my complaints and wouldn’t stop until I actually tasted one. Blecch. Regarding the peter peppers; so how do they taste? ---
**Author:** ![Whammo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8dc957/32.png) [@Whammo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whammo)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2007, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/177 "2007-03-20T23:06:29Z")
[QUOTE=Batsinma Belfry] Slugs are gross enough on their own. But… [Slugs having sex.](http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/upload/2006/06/mating_slugs.jpg) [/QUOTE] Just what in Gods name is exactly HAPPENING in that picture??? I’m so confused! ---
**Author:** ![Mtgman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5a626/32.png) [@Mtgman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mtgman)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2007, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/178 "2007-03-20T23:26:25Z")
[QUOTE=Harmonious Discord] I can ignore any indecent resemblance in all except the Peter Peppers. You can’t ignore that, but it’s phalic not gross. Here’s the phalic Dog Stinkhorn and the Clathrus. [Fungus link](http://botit.botany.wisc.edu/toms_fungi/oct2006.html) Chum you reminded me of something else gross. [Slime mold.](http://plant_doctor.typepad.com/the_seasoned_gardener/2006/08/dont_blame_the_.html) [/QUOTE] And where there are slime molds, there may be slime mold beetles. [Like Bushi, Cheneyi, and Rumsfeldi](http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/April05/slime-mold.Bush.Cheney.ssl.html) > [@](#): > > Two former Cornell University entomologists who recently had the job of naming 65 new species of slime-mold beetles named three species that are new to science in the genus Agathidium for members of the U.S. administration. They are A. bushi Miller and Wheeler, A. cheneyi Miller and Wheeler and A. rumsfeldi Miller and Wheeler. Enjoy, Steven ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2007, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/179 "2007-03-20T23:30:16Z")
[QUOTE=Whammo] Just what in Gods name is exactly HAPPENING in that picture??? I’m so confused! [/QUOTE] David Attenborough has an documentary on this slug and its mating ritual. I believe it was in the episode on silkspinners in the series on insects. Anyway, the slugs hang together on a thread they have made together. In an intricate dance that lasts hours, each one leaves a sperm packet somewhere in that silken/slimey pod that the other one takes in itself by crawling through it. Or something. ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2007, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612/180 "2007-03-20T23:39:01Z")
[QUOTE=Harmonious Discord] …something else gross. [Slime mold.](http://plant_doctor.typepad.com/the_seasoned_gardener/2006/08/dont_blame_the_.html) [/QUOTE] [Slime moulds are fascinating.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slime_mould)Slime moulds are truly the closest thing to aliens we have on Earth. They are neither bacteria nor fungus. The best way to describe them is like a fungus that can walk. Or a coral organism without its shell, walking on land. Did you know slime moulds can [solve puzzels?](http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s189608.htm) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-nature-grosses-you-out/395612.md?page=10)