What insect have you had as a pet, and how rewarding was it?

When I was young there was that kind of bug that was regularly sold as pet. They mostly targeted us children. I still don’t know the name, but the bug was very big – about a quarter of a 6-year-old’s hand – and was all black. It looked similar to a dung beetle, and it mainly ate leaves, as they said when they sold it to us. The bugs were extremely popular with schoolchildren, especially boys. Each came with a piece of thread around the body, and the thread acted like a dog collar. The boys would hold the thread in their hands and spun the bugs around, and that scared the heck out of some girls (and the spinning game was a favorite game among the bugs’ owners)!

I once bought one and raised it like a regular dog. That mean I didn’t spin the bug like many others. I tried to be as gentle as I could, feeding it regularly and sometimes played with it. I couldn’t tell if it liked me or not (probably not), but I was fond of it. The only thing I didn’t like about it was that it wasn’t enthusiastic to play my games. One day I brought it to school with the intention to show it around the class, and one boy stole it and crushed it right in front of me! I cried for two days after that :(

Stick bugs and praying mantis. I still love them- they get really big here.

I owned a spider, for a second.

There was Charlie the spider who lived on my bedroom wall at some stage during my teens, he wasn’t exactly company but strangely I enjoyed his presence.

I did have a spider of some sort who decided to make residents in my bedroom near the window, he was a good size too, it was very obvious as well, I think he came to escape the winters chill, I allowed him to stay and at times I’d noticed he wouldn’t move, I swatted a horsefly and tossed it into my new roomates web, as soon as the fly made motions to struggle he became dinner. Thats when our friendship began.

Inch worm. I made a terrarium in a carton and kept it on our 3rd floor terrace. I don’t think it lasted very long. I don’t remember if he crawled away or if my mom made me set him free.

Here are a few of my “pet bug” stories. http://www.fluther.com/175653/what-unusual-thing-have-you-found-out-about-spiders-or-bugs/

@Mimishu1995 Here’s a link to one type of beetle pet in Southeast Asia. http://www.thingsasian.com/stories-photos/40067

We’ve kept as pets everything from potato bugs (rolly-pollies) to grasshoppers, caterpillars, and praying mantises. In addition we’ve also had four kinds of spiders- the largest black widow I’ve ever seen, a jumping spider with lovely iridescent green fangs, two enormous wolf spiders, and a tarantula. The tarantula and wolf spiders were called Chainsaw 1, 2, and 3.

I had a neighbor who kept pet ant lions in his bedroom and numerous colonies of ants in gallon pickle jars under his cherry tree.

I don’t know if this qualifies as a pet bug, but when I was a child there was a species of june bug that doubled quite well as a piece of jewelry because they’d stick to your clothes and not move once you put them somewhere. We’d place them on our clothes and pretend we were grand ladies at a ball. They were a gorgeous golden brown, and when we picked them up, they’d make this raspy protesting noise. We called them “cuss bugs”.

I spent many summers on my grandfather’s ranch in Southern Utah. For some reason honey bees were attracted to the grain used to feed his cattle, and if they got too much grain dust on them, they’d lose the ability to fly. My cousins and I would catch them by their wings, and wetting a bit of our tee-shirt, we’d rub their bottoms on the wet spot until their stingers came out. Then we could safely play with our “pets” until we were distracted by other fun things to do (Yeah I know. Don’t start. We were mean little kids.)

Years ago I had a friend who kept a baby bird eating spider (the kind that grows to bird eating size). Spiders only eat live food (it must be moving). His had grown large enough he had to start feeding it live baby mice. He said that feeding it was right out of a horror film.

Mexican Jumping Beans The entertainment factor wore off after awhile.

Uncle Milton’s Ant Farm about 60 years ago. Not much of a “pet” though.

I had a spider for maybe a day when I was a kid. But we let it go. I would always try to trap bugs and then release them back out in nature. Unless it was a roach or ant, or mosquito or flies or stink bug, wasp or yellow jacket. As for bees, I just try to avoid contact with them. No love in my heart for them. So long as they don’t try to move into my house or on my porch, then I have no beef with most of them. I see most of them as necessary to nature. Not a pet.

I just remembered we would catch lightening bugs in a jar. We only kept them a short time, less than an hour. I can’t say they were pets, we were their captors I guess. They are just so flipping fascinating. Does anyone ever take them for granted?

If you ever have lived in a place without fireflies and then visit or move to a place without them, they are like childhood all over again.

I never had an insect but I did have an arachnid.

He was a Brown Haitian tarantula named Vivian (after The Young Ones character) and he was outstanding.

My kids and I had a praying mantis as a pet for about six months.

I walked out the door one day and “he” was on the walk. I caught him in a mayo jar, and knowing nothing about mantids, I put some leaves in with him. After four or five days he was languid, so I did a little research on the internet (this was before Google) and found out they liked grass hoppers.

My son and I went down to a pet store, got a 5 gallon terrarium, and two dozen grasshoppers. when we put he mantis in the terrarium and added the hoppers, he went to town, catching and eating four in less than five minutes. And he ate the rest in the nxt day or so.

I had a tarantula for 18 years. She was pretty cool, and very mellow.

Great bug stories!
I’d love to keep a mantis or stick.