January 19, 2008: HUGE Scorpion

Never fear!!! This scary bugger doesnt scuttle amongst us these days, but is actually a digitally created version of the Eurypterids that lived in the Devonian age.

These ancestors to our current day (and size) scorpions were believed to grow up to 2 metres long and were one of the first amphibious animals.

I thought great white sharks were scary!!

The guy in the pics is Nigel Marven, wildlife presenter.

Looks like a really jumbo shrimp!

cue the theme to Jaws.
no wait, make that Claws.

No stinger?

Too much like a lobster. Butter sauce, anyone?

Looks like something from an alien flick.

About the only thing I can say about this thing is, uh---AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Crawfish

I bet Buster has a recipe for it.

steam that sucker up!

Kind of makes me wonder what he was actually holding before the photo was changed. A fish? A lobster? A small hooker named Arial?

Mmm roasted scorpion

I've eaten barbecued scorpion, in China.

I've used boiled scorpion for stroke patients- it is part of the materia medica.

But one that size, boggles the mind.

What a monster, I wonder if that pincer on the tail can do much damage?

High Colby, welcome to the cellar.

That bad boy looks like it was designed to Velcro-wrap around its dinner, and since it's technically probably an arthropod I'm guessing it wasn't too picky about whether or not dinner was dead when it started eating. As crabs, scorpions, lobsters, crayfish, tarantulas and shrimp are all arthropods, I'd say cook it up just like any other critter hiding tasty meat under a hard exoskeleton (which excludes turtles because they have an endoskeleton partially modified to exo). Many are boiled; scorpions and tarantulas are often roasted on a spit or wrapped in leaves.

For the record, I've never eaten scorpions or tarantulas. I don't get wildly excited about lobster. I have had crayfish, but just plain because I caught them myself in Oregon as a kid. I do enjoy shrimp and LOVE Dungeness crab especially.