Scorpion, stinging and eating a "kissing" or "assassin" bug

In the morning, after sleeping on a large boulder on a tiny beach below an old lighthouse in Cabo Corrientes, Jalisco Mexico, I found this entomological drama going on under my backpack right next to me. Hopefully the bug was not carrying Chagas's disease, an Trypanosome protozoan parasite (Trypanosoma cruzi) infection spread by these blood-sucking "assassin" bugs of the subfamily Triatominae (family Reduviidae)

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Scorpion
• Kissing
• Assassin
• bug
• Trypanosoma
• cruzi
• Triatominae
• (family
• Reduviidae)
• Chagas's
• disease

[waterjourney]

Because it was my own "private" boulder, on my own "private" beach, down below an old lighthouse, two day hitchiking down a dirt road and a boat ride away from any other gringo touron. Why do you ask?

[waterjourney]

I was the closest source of blood as far as I could see. I had been sleeping on top of a big granite boulder the size of a microbus at the base of some cliffs right by the ocean. These guys were under my backpack which was lying right next to me all night. My suspicion is that the kissing bug flew in at night, fed on me, and weighted down with my blood, or perhaps injured, was vulnerable to capture as it perhaps could not immediately fly away. The scorpion, knowing it business, found its prey.

[hippyandchicky]

Scorpion saved your ass..

[waterjourney]

Actually I am not sure that I did not get infected with Chagas's disease. The Assasin bug was full of what quite probably was my blood. It is hard to see on the video as it has gotten blurry for some reason. i need to reupload. It may take up to 20 years for the protozoans to start eating me from the inside. Tests are often inconclusive and I have no health insurance. But its all kind of romantic as Darwin died of the same disease.

[starcat971]

I like your style!

[DTeKDeV]

@waterjourney What if you get a wife. Would it be awkward to tell your wife you have stuff eating you?

[pipercolt1963]

just watched 1000 ways to die tonight on that thing, some guy in brazil got bit, didn't kill him till 20 years later, up here in Canada however, we've got another little nasty called a deer tick, it gives you something similar, called lime desease, only you can't see them their so small

[jesus77755]

the scorpion's like "HA, kissing bug, took care of your ass, here you go, i kill the bug you hate".

[Kerberoz01]

damn, never seen a bug keep struggling that long after a buthid sting... tough little bastard

[arbatson]

Wouldn't you know if you got bitten by an assassin bug? I read their bites are more painful than a wasp. I found some in my garden (in Austin TX) and burned them with my fireplace lighter. They ate some of my caterpillar friends. jackasses. not welcome in my garden.

[stealthwolf29]

@undeadpresident IDK man, just trying to suggest things that might make him feel better, but I have little tiny circles that zoom across my eye all the time in the right lighting... idk.

[undeadpresident]

@stealthwolf29 Floaters don't swim, they float. That's like comparing a piece of driftwood to a fish.

[stealthwolf29]

@undeadpresident Everyone has those! They're called floaters. They are just broken pieces of tissue in your eye fluid! If not that, it could also be just little cells or bacteria. Go to an eye doctor and get it checked out! Hope I helped!

[apraksti]

your lucky that thing came