Striped Bark Scorpion

Striped Bark Scorpion

 Centruroides vittatus

A change of pace in this post away from things that fly to things that crawl.  In this case, it's a Striped Bark Scorpion we found at the ranch hiding under a rock trying to stay cool on a 99 degree Texas summer day.  You can see the striping well on this one and the little triangle on the head that points to its eyes.  Seems like there is one of these guys hiding under every rock in the hill country and we've had to keep our eyes open as we clean up around the place.  Scorpions are interesting little critters as they are actually arachnids like spiders and ticks (count the legs, there are 8).  I've never been stung by one (yet) but they say it's like a wasp sting so it probably hurts for a half hour or so.  This kind of scorpion won't kill you unless you have some kind of allergy to their venom but I'm sure a sting can induce some choice words to flow from your brain to your mouth.  They are not very aggressive and tend to try to hide again after they are uncovered.  Scorpions do get a little defensive when poked with a stick, like when you are trying to position them for a photo.  They catch all kinds of bugs for dinner and inject venom in them with their stinger.  They have very tiny mouths so they inject digestive juices into their catch to make an insect smoothie for dinner.  Another cool thing about scorpions is that they glow fluorescent under a black light at night.  Most of the ones I've seen on a night time blacklight hunt are a glowing green color.  I've actually seen scorpions all over Texas from the piney woods in the east to the hot, dry caliche ground in the south to the Davis Mountains area in the west.