Have you ever ordered crickets online? Don't!

Purple Lady · 12-30-2018, 02:23 PM

A Washington Post reporter ordered crickets for the family's pet lizard. Things did not go well. He posted about it on Twitter and wrote a story about it in the Washington Post.

Here's the first Twitter post:
So, a shipment of crickets for the lizard arrived via FedEx today. It was my first time ordering bulk crickets off the internet, and I naively assumed that they would be in like, a bag or some other contraption to facilitate easy transfer to another container. They were not.

There's around 20 posts, and one of the later ones says:
I make this information public because if I do not send any tweets tomorrow, it is because my wife murdered me after finding a cricket in our bed in the middle of the night. And that's the news from Red Lake Falls.

He also talks about the cats in the story and said that The cats were having what I can only imagine was the greatest day of their lives.
Briana later told me that she first realized something was terribly wrong when one of the cats suddenly leaped on to a pumpkin pie that had been warming on the countertop. It was going after an unusually large cricket that was munching the filling.

Here's the entire Twitter feed:
https://twitter.com/_cingraham/statu...30244428042241

https://www.washingtonpost.com/busin...=.2a5b34b82ba4

OtinG · 12-30-2018, 02:59 PM

Funny story! I read it yesterday on the Washington Post. I adopted a feral kitty 20+ years ago who survived around my neighborhood be eating crickets that congregated around street lights. She had no choice at the time, but after I adopted her she was well fed. But my current kitties who have been indoor cats all their lives and always well fed turn their noses up at crickets when they see them in the house. They might follow them around for a few minutes but they never eat them.

Purple Lady · 12-30-2018, 03:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by OtinG

Funny story! I read it yesterday on the Washington Post. I adopted a feral kitty 20+ years ago who survived around my neighborhood be eating crickets that congregated around street lights. She had no choice at the time, but after I adopted her she was well fed. But my current kitties who have been indoor cats all their lives and always well fed turn their noses up at crickets when they see them in the house. They might follow them around for a few minutes but they never eat them.

When I lived in a house that regularly got crickets inside (a couple of times a week) my kitties usually ate them after playing with them. Where I live now we get mice inside at times. The kitty in my avatar saw one in the family room, and she just followed it around the perimeter of the room. It was hilarious. The mouse was smart enough to just move a little bit at a time, then she moved a little, and that went on for quite a while. I wish I had thought to video it.

OtinG · 12-30-2018, 03:40 PM

There was a British documentary a few years ago where researches went to a small town in SE England that had a lot of pet cats. They managed to get approval from many of the residents to put GPS tracking devices on about 50 indoor/outdoor cats, and video cams on a few of them. Then they tracked their movements for several months. The findings were pretty interesting and some were even surprising. Most of the residents who owned cats let them come and go as they pleased. Each cat had his/her own territory they traversed, but most shared the same territory with other cats. Somehow they figured out a schedule so that they rarely traveled their territory when other cats were therein, and they tended to stick to a daily time schedule presumably to avoid contact with the others who used that territory. Females had smaller territories than males. Many of the cats new the schedules of the other cats and would wait until the other cat(s) were out and about then would go to their homes, enter the cat doors, and eat their food. That was actually pretty common! Kind of a "keep your eyes on your fries" thing I guess. I know my cats believe what is theirs is theirs and what is yours is theirs too! The cats that ventured into wooded areas rarely hunted. They would check out birds and mice, but very rarely hunted them much less killed them. Most of the domesticated cats seemed to have lost their hunting skills, or at least showed little to no interest in hunting. Other research has also shown that despite complaints that domesticated cats ravage the ecosystem through hunting, they rarely hunt and kill. Feral kitties would be different of course as they have no choice.

Purple Lady · 12-30-2018, 04:06 PM

I love that the cats went inside other cat's houses and ate their food!

One of my cats was actually attacked by birds in our back yard. They were swooping down on her until she ran away. I guess she got a little too close to one of them.

The kitty in my avatar actually caught a bird when she was inside a screened in porch and the bird was outside. There was a bush right next to the screen that the bird was sitting on and kitty jumped up, stuck her claws through the screen, and managed to catch onto the bird's wings. I heard all the noise and went out and yelled and she jumped down. She was about five feet up.

Hemmi · 12-30-2018, 04:28 PM

My friend has bearded dragons and the FedEx guy once helpfully crammed the box between her screen door and front door. When she got home, both doors were both covered in crickets.

tubemonkey · 12-30-2018, 04:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Purple Lady

A Washington Post reporter ordered crickets for the family's pet lizard. Things did not go well. He posted about it on Twitter and wrote a story about it in the Washington Post.

Here's the first Twitter post:
So, a shipment of crickets for the lizard arrived via FedEx today. It was my first time ordering bulk crickets off the internet, and I naively assumed that they would be in like, a bag or some other contraption to facilitate easy transfer to another container. They were not.

By Jiminy!

Spoiler:

Purple Lady · 12-30-2018, 06:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hemmi

My friend has bearded dragons and the FedEx guy once helpfully crammed the box between her screen door and front door. When she got home, both doors were both covered in crickets.

I hope she told FedEx to come back to get the damaged box and contents.

cromag · 12-30-2018, 07:39 PM

Sounds like there's still a few bugs in the system.

PeterT · 12-30-2018, 11:39 PM

When I was young (and before moving from England to Canada), one trip to visit grandparents in Swansea my parents went to the market and ordered some laverbread to be shipped to our home in Banbury.

Laverbread is a Welsh dish made from seaweed.

I remember hearing about the poor postman when he delivered the package; a plastic bag filled with laverbread that was (for lack of a better term) jiggling in his hands, rather like a large bag of Jello.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

12-30-2018, 02:23 PM	#1
Purple Lady Grand Sorcerer Posts: 5,698 Karma: 16542228 Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: Pennsylvania Device: Huawei MediaPad M5, LG V30, Boyue T80S, Nexus 7 LTE, K3 3G, Fire HD8	Have you ever ordered crickets online? Don't! A Washington Post reporter ordered crickets for the family's pet lizard. Things did not go well. He posted about it on Twitter and wrote a story about it in the Washington Post. Here's the first Twitter post: So, a shipment of crickets for the lizard arrived via FedEx today. It was my first time ordering bulk crickets off the internet, and I naively assumed that they would be in like, a bag or some other contraption to facilitate easy transfer to another container. They were not. There's around 20 posts, and one of the later ones says: I make this information public because if I do not send any tweets tomorrow, it is because my wife murdered me after finding a cricket in our bed in the middle of the night. And that's the news from Red Lake Falls. He also talks about the cats in the story and said that The cats were having what I can only imagine was the greatest day of their lives. Briana later told me that she first realized something was terribly wrong when one of the cats suddenly leaped on to a pumpkin pie that had been warming on the countertop. It was going after an unusually large cricket that was munching the filling. Here's the entire Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/_cingraham/statu...30244428042241 https://www.washingtonpost.com/busin...=.2a5b34b82ba4 Last edited by Purple Lady; 12-30-2018 at 02:35 PM.

12-30-2018, 03:40 PM	#4
OtinG Old Gadget Guy Posts: 1,906 Karma: 6854865 Join Date: Jun 2018 Device: Oasis 3, iPhone 13 Pro Max, iPad mini 6, iPad Air 2020, Alexa Devices	There was a British documentary a few years ago where researches went to a small town in SE England that had a lot of pet cats. They managed to get approval from many of the residents to put GPS tracking devices on about 50 indoor/outdoor cats, and video cams on a few of them. Then they tracked their movements for several months. The findings were pretty interesting and some were even surprising. Most of the residents who owned cats let them come and go as they pleased. Each cat had his/her own territory they traversed, but most shared the same territory with other cats. Somehow they figured out a schedule so that they rarely traveled their territory when other cats were therein, and they tended to stick to a daily time schedule presumably to avoid contact with the others who used that territory. Females had smaller territories than males. Many of the cats new the schedules of the other cats and would wait until the other cat(s) were out and about then would go to their homes, enter the cat doors, and eat their food. That was actually pretty common! Kind of a "keep your eyes on your fries" thing I guess. I know my cats believe what is theirs is theirs and what is yours is theirs too! The cats that ventured into wooded areas rarely hunted. They would check out birds and mice, but very rarely hunted them much less killed them. Most of the domesticated cats seemed to have lost their hunting skills, or at least showed little to no interest in hunting. Other research has also shown that despite complaints that domesticated cats ravage the ecosystem through hunting, they rarely hunt and kill. Feral kitties would be different of course as they have no choice. Last edited by OtinG; 12-30-2018 at 03:43 PM.

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12-30-2018, 02:59 PM	#2
OtinG Old Gadget Guy Posts: 1,906 Karma: 6854865 Join Date: Jun 2018 Device: Oasis 3, iPhone 13 Pro Max, iPad mini 6, iPad Air 2020, Alexa Devices	Funny story! I read it yesterday on the Washington Post. I adopted a feral kitty 20+ years ago who survived around my neighborhood be eating crickets that congregated around street lights. She had no choice at the time, but after I adopted her she was well fed. But my current kitties who have been indoor cats all their lives and always well fed turn their noses up at crickets when they see them in the house. They might follow them around for a few minutes but they never eat them.

12-30-2018, 04:06 PM	#5
Purple Lady Grand Sorcerer Posts: 5,698 Karma: 16542228 Join Date: Feb 2010 Location: Pennsylvania Device: Huawei MediaPad M5, LG V30, Boyue T80S, Nexus 7 LTE, K3 3G, Fire HD8	I love that the cats went inside other cat's houses and ate their food! One of my cats was actually attacked by birds in our back yard. They were swooping down on her until she ran away. I guess she got a little too close to one of them. The kitty in my avatar actually caught a bird when she was inside a screened in porch and the bird was outside. There was a bush right next to the screen that the bird was sitting on and kitty jumped up, stuck her claws through the screen, and managed to catch onto the bird's wings. I heard all the noise and went out and yelled and she jumped down. She was about five feet up.

12-30-2018, 04:28 PM	#6
Hemmi Grand Sorcerer Posts: 9,350 Karma: 15987608 Join Date: Apr 2015 Device: Sonys, Nooks, Kobo Libra, Forma, Mini, Paperwhite	My friend has bearded dragons and the FedEx guy once helpfully crammed the box between her screen door and front door. When she got home, both doors were both covered in crickets.

12-30-2018, 07:39 PM	#9
cromag Surfin the alpha waves ~~ Posts: 24,279 Karma: 459220161 Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: New Jersey Device: Jetbook Lite & Mini, Nook STR, Kobo, Hanvon N516, Kindle 2, Androids	Sounds like there's still a few bugs in the system.

12-30-2018, 11:39 PM	#10
PeterT Grand Sorcerer Posts: 12,159 Karma: 73448616 Join Date: Nov 2007 Location: Toronto Device: Nexus 7, Clara, Touch, Tolino EPOS	When I was young (and before moving from England to Canada), one trip to visit grandparents in Swansea my parents went to the market and ordered some laverbread to be shipped to our home in Banbury. Laverbread is a Welsh dish made from seaweed. I remember hearing about the poor postman when he delivered the package; a plastic bag filled with laverbread that was (for lack of a better term) jiggling in his hands, rather like a large bag of Jello. Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk