June Bug

A June bug
is a wonderful thing,
especially
flying in circles
at the end of a string.

*My own children sadly are products of urban limitations. Bugs are something to spray with a can of Raid. They think it was really gross that I used to play with bugs. Just as quickly as they ridicule my primitive past, they are anxious to point out it was bug abuse to tie a string to their legs for our own amusement. We were careful - it wasn’t like we were pulling their wings off or something like that....

What we called June Bugs in Southern California were large, hearty beetles about the size of extra large black olives, except they were a lovely, rich, velvet brown color with a fuzzy darker scruff across their shoulders. Mid-Summer nights were for collecting them by the handful as they flocked to our dining room windows and front door screens. If you petted them just right, they would raise up on their haunches and hiss pretty loud - good times!

The only abusive thing we did was to grab our grey Banty hen Susan and hold her up to the hapless June Bugs clinging to the screens. It was a sadistic joy to watch her gobble those enormous beetles without the benefit of teeth and chewing. Sweet little Susan was chillingly voracious; we lost count of her victims during our shrieks of "Ah, there's another one! Boss!" It’s a wonder we didn’t kill her - her bulging craw would literally be hissing and moving with live June Bugs ~ kind of like Peter and the Wolf, but different.