Welcome to Natural Wonders! I hope, if you’re in the northern hemisphere, that you’ve been able to enjoy the fall season and all the beautiful colors, blue skies, and campfire weather that usually comes with it. The leaves are crunching underfoot and I feel guilty any time I’m stuck inside instead of wandering around the woods before they go to sleep for the winter…
I loved this. It might have horrified me if I wasn't already familiar with these beasties. In New Zealand, there's a fungus, known by the common name of "vegetable caterpillar" that basically zombified caterpillars. The Māori people used to collect the zombified caterpillars and use them as a pigment for traditional tattoos. There are related fungi which infect other insects, including cicadas. We also have the horsehair worms (which we call Gordian worms) which infect our native wingless cricket, the wētā. It causes the same behaviour in wētā as it does in crickets.
*sits in silence for a while*
BLOODY HELL.
.....
*sits silently for a while longer*
This is good content but I don’t want to share it and ruin somebody’s day.
I loved this. It might have horrified me if I wasn't already familiar with these beasties. In New Zealand, there's a fungus, known by the common name of "vegetable caterpillar" that basically zombified caterpillars. The Māori people used to collect the zombified caterpillars and use them as a pigment for traditional tattoos. There are related fungi which infect other insects, including cicadas. We also have the horsehair worms (which we call Gordian worms) which infect our native wingless cricket, the wētā. It causes the same behaviour in wētā as it does in crickets.