Are you entomophobic, neutral, or an entomophile?

I like insects. They’re interesting in their variety, social structures, uses, and activities. They provide a lot of food for other species too.

I love insects. Up here in my area we get huge hatchings of little green caterpillars in the spring in the oak trees. I think they are oak moth catepillars and they are everywhere for weeks. Coincides with all the parent songbirds that need plentiful amounts of little insects for their nestlings.

I think they are extremely interesting in general yes but the one thing I cannot deal with as a family of insects is caterpillars. They have been my greatest fear since I was a toddler. Getting over it I now believe is hopeless. They have the potential to ruin my entire day. Many people cannot believe this and think I’m joking. I’M NOT.

Caterpillars huh. But they turn into magnificent Monarchs or Swallowtails, to name a few. I let the Swallowtail caterpilars munch a bit on my plants for that reason.

@Adirondackwannabe Butterflies for the most part are okay with me. But caterpillars….I shudder every time I think of them. Luckily I don’t see them much anymore but growing up there was a particularly heavy few years of them….this was in PA, maybe it was the same for you in the 90s in NY?

We had a few years were the gypsy moth caterpillars were so thick you couldn’t walk on the sidewalk without stepping on one or two with each step. And they were hanging down all over the place. That was gross.
Edit: We’re a Tree City, meaning we have tons of trees.

I love insects and all animals!

i’m jealous of the US East Coasters and their 2013 cicada outbreak.

We had one in 2007. I drove into the woods and called some friends in California so they could hear the cicadas.

The cicadas were so loud, the phone shut down! I am not kidding! We couldn’t hear each other anyway but the phone turned off!

I find insects fascinating, but prefer they stay outside my home.

So long as their lifestyle does not endanger me or my few possessions, I find them fascinating and we easily co-exist.

@deni I know someone who is absolutely terrified of caterpillars, so you are not alone, I must admit though that her fear has always puzzled me, what could be so scary about caterpillars as to make her take about a five metre berth around a swan plant covered in monarch butterfly caterpillars? She commented to me on one occasion that as a child she did not have the fear.

As for me, I like insects.

Terrified.
Lots of people that I know are terrified of spiders, but all creepy crawlies are equal in my book. I’ve been afraid of them for as long as I can remember. I remember the first time I saw a preying mantis, I was about 6, and I stood on my neighbor’s front stoop and screamed bloody murder until my mother came running. When she found out that I was screaming about a bug, well, let’s just say she overreacted a bit, too.
I’ve tried so hard to tackle my phobia, but I’ve never been able to lighten up about it. It is such an incredibly deep rooted fear, I can’t shake it.

Hate them. I don’t care how cool they look or how much good they do, I am pretty sure they are Satan’s spawn.

I’m on the fence. I find insects fascinating and I value them greatly as part of the ecosystem. I go out of my way to avoid killing insects and try to make sure they are put outside. I like to watch docos and the like about their activities. Still, in the real world some of them give me the heebie-jeebies. Crickets and cicadas and some flying beetles make me very nervous.

@Bellatrix flying beetles are at the top of my list. Just thinking about it now gave me a shiver.

Ugh, the thought of them landing in my hair. I don’t kill them though. I ask my husband to remove them to an environment more suited to them.

If you could see my face right now. Uck.

I can’t kill them. I’m afraid to kill all bugs, but beetles are the worst because they are crunchy. Anything with a hard body… eggh. I can’t talk about this, I’m getting the heebie jeebies.

I love the look of bugs. I think ants are the coolest. It’s interesting how they clean up areas and know how to get back to their colonies via scented paths. I still scream like a five-year-old girl when I see a spider though.

My man…. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKc1PURJoJg

I love insects! I kept Madagascar Hissing Cockroaches as pets for about 6 years. They are probably some of my all time favorite bugs.

I used to custom decorate their aquarium with all kinds of grasses and branches for them to explore, and they always had good fruits and veggies to eat. Apples are their favorite and they would often follow around a piece of apple in my hand trying to get it. I had about, 20 or so, and they multiplied fairly regularly, so I always had babies. They are actually very good parents and the females give live birth. The babies hang pretty close to the adults for quite awhile. The males are hilarious too. The dominant ones would each claim a piece of bark and defend it and their ladies with everything they had. I would often wake up in the middle of the night to them hissing and shaking at each other. If things got really intense, they would try to push each other off the bark or bite their opponents antennas off. Haha.

God, I could talk about them forever. I miss them. :(

Picture of some of mine.

I am scared of a lot of insects, and I hate that I am. I don’t want to be. It is a gut reaction and I’m not sure how to override that even though I don’t want to have it. I logically understand how important and basically harmless insects are, I have a pretty good scientific appreciation for how cool they are, but that doesn’t change the fact that if one gets on me, my adrenaline spikes and I have to do an idiotic whirlwind dance before I can relax again. If anyone has any advice on this matter my ears are open!

Some of them don’t bother me at all. I don’t understand my brain.

Neutral.