Comments on: A Parktown Prawn in my shoe

By: Jones

Jones — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 13:44:21 +0000

Now I know why our brothers from the far north were livid when depicted as these repulsive things on District 9. A friend of mine told me about them four years ago with an expression of a 911 survivor and I thought I had an understanding of how disgusting theses things are. I recently bought a house in Midrand and I was standing in the garden while mentally mapping out how my garden would look like.

Two seconds later, I was running for the door when this ghastly creature the size of what appeared to be a gautrain came steamrolling towards me with a vengeance of an outlaw. I spent the whole day at work doing internet research on how to kill these things but only succeeded in intensifying my horror.

I have read that another one of gautengs unwelcomed visitors, the Fat Gray Habiba Idis is responsible for the decline of these demonic creatures. The bird is reported to be eating these things to extinction. So, this is how the war is going to be worn:
1. Make your garden habiba friendly ( no cats and dogs in the garden);
2. Avoid thick bushy plants in your garden;
3. Limit the moisture on the garden;
4. Toil the soil now and again to disrupt their habitat;
5. Close doors and windows early, 16h00;

We lost the chemical war. Time for plan B. Oh, I’m naming my next child Habiba, LOL

By: Leoni

Leoni — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 13:12:46 +0000

I had a very bad experience with a Parktown Prawn. I did not that this was a Parktown Prawn untill this morning, when somebody at my work told me what it was. I was busy with my make-up and felt this scratch on my back. At first I thought it was the label of my top only to dicover I dont have a label on my top anymore. So I carried on with my make-up and I felt it again. I then alost hit my head off my body to get this thing of my back and then it tangled with my hair. I evently got the thing of me and saw this ugly thing. I hit it a few times with a shoe before it died. The rest off the day I keep feeling this Parktown Prawn on me. This was really not a Lekker feelling.

By: Nic Haralambous » Blog Archive » The best way to kill a Parktown Prawn

Nic Haralambous » Blog Archive » The best way to kill a Parktown Prawn — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 08:51:41 +0000

[...] Hi and welcome to my blog! If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting and do come back.Ages ago I blogged about my experiences with Parktown Prawns. [...]

By: Mike

Mike — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 08:37:49 +0000

We found out about parktown prawns the hard way. One morning, my father woke up one morning and opened his eyes to see the underneath of a large adult prawn sitting on his face. Well, let me just say that his head hit the light fitting.

Since then, I have had a few incidents. I put on shoes, tied the laces and only then did I feel something walking around on my foot. I’m so glad I wear socks with shoes.

A few days ago, I put on a pair of jeans and sat down to put my shoes on and felt a prick in the side of my leg, like a black jack or something. So I rubbed it a bit and the spikey feeling moved all the way down my leg as I prodded at it until a small parktown prawn popped out the bottom.

In the last two weeks, I have had at least one parktown prawn in my house every 2 days. I must have a nest in the garden and my stupid cats seem to enjoy bringing them in to play.

I think the best way to get rid of them is with a tennis racket, a container that can close and a brick. (This is a two man approach):
Step1:
Approach slowly with the tennis racket while your partner stands by with the container and lid.
Step 2:
Prod the prawn to make it jump.
Step 3:
When it jumps, take a full swing with the racket, if you hit it against the wall hard enough, you may knock it out temporarily.
Step 4:
Quickly, get the prawn in the container before it recovers, move fast, it does not take long.
Step 5:
Find a solid piece of ground outside, this is the messy part.
Step 6:
Shake the container rapidly to knock the prawn out and chuck it on the ground.
Step 7:
Flatten the prawn with the brick.
Step 8:
Clean up the mess before the other prawns find out.
Step 9:
Run inside and lock all the doors and windows.
Step 10:
Seek councelling..

By: Bronwin

Bronwin — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 08:28:27 +0000

OMG i have never really seen a one…. are they reall that big?????? i heard that if you pour boiling water on them they scream……??????

By: robert

robert — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 18:12:49 +0000

Parktown Prawns on toast with mayo and spinach salad. Yummy!

Yeah right.

I still shudder at the memory of the damn things. Ugh

By: Julian Nkolo

Julian Nkolo — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 13:17:05 +0000

I’ve been in Jo’burg for 5 yrs now and had only heard rumours about the Parktown prawn and I even thought that it was something that was made up by parents to scare kids who don’t want to chow their green veges, until 2 weeks ago. I opened the curtain in the morning to check the weather and I saw something moving in the patio which at first I thought was a bird or a mice and when I looked again I saw this giant cricket walking around and other smaller insects getting out of it’s way. I must say that nobody had to tell me what that was, my goodness I have never seen such a huge insect and I use to think that the big flying roach that stays in storm drains is huge but now I stand corrected. Well all I can say is that I have’nt been out in the patio since then and if I could find it in my shoes I would move back to the Cape.

I hope your toe will get better soon better now.

Julia