Re: CHAT of pillbugs and pilcrows (was: Greek letter names etc)
| From: | Mark J. Reed <markjreed@...> |
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| Date: | Thursday, March 11, 2004, 1:40 |
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On Wed, Mar 10, 2004 at 05:09:05PM -0800, Adam Walker wrote:
> Cute. My "here" is North Texas. Where is your
> "here"?
Grew up in Middle Georgia. Now live in Atlanta, which is rather north
of Middle.
The AHD lists "pill bug" as the primary entry, citing "wood louse",
"doodlebug", "roly-poly", and "slater" as synonyms. Interestingly,
it indicates that all of the terms "pill bug", "wood louse", "doodlebug"
and "slater" may refer to either two different categories of terrestrial
crustaction, one consisting of species from genus Armadillidum and the
other consisting of species from either Oniscus or Porcellio. However,
roly-poly" refers exclusively to the former, which have the ability to
curl into a ball when disturbed, an ability the critters in the latter
category lack.
-Mark
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