Zizotes Juju Bwana!!!!

Long have the Druids been of the opinion that nobody living knows what zizotes, as in hierba de zizotes, is. No. When it comes to zizotes, all the mere mortals go around merely spouting off. Yes they do. It’s zizotes this and zizotes that. But ask one of them, Hey dumbass, what’s zizotes?, and they get a confused expression on their bovine countenances typical of your average dumbass. That’s because nobody knows what zizotes is.

The reason Crumby is bringing up zizotes again is because a visually pleasing long horned beetle is all over the Asclepias oenotherioides in these parts at this nonce. So maybe a zizote is a long horned beetle. Who knows? But probably not.

Anyway, this beetle may be Tetraopes femoratus because it obviously has reddish femurs. Or probably not. Maybe zizotes means reddish femurs in the long lost language of some malodorous tribe of semi-noble savages that worshiped these particular beetles long ago. Who knows?

In any event, the important point is, this beetle here depicted is associated with Asclepias oenotherioides. Since this particular beetle is supposed to be host specific, and none of these beetles have been declared exclusively for A.oenotherioides, I do declare that this beetle is Tetraopes crumbianus ssp. zizotes.

But getting even more serious, is hierba de zizotes native to these parts. Course not. How could it be? Since nobody knows what zizotes is, obviously zizotes is an extraterrestrial term, or at least, like Honduran. How do you know that the Honduran cheap labor or maybe space aliens didn't introduce hierba de zizotes to these parts via their long pants cuffs? Right. You don't know that or shit. It's cuffs that are sometimes on the bottom of pants? Right.

If hierba de zizotes is an introduced alien plant, what plants are native to these parts? Well now, there are twain native plants that arrived in these parts at about the same time as the native white people. These plants are tall grass and short grass. Sometimes the tall grass is referenced as jonson or johnsongrass. The short grass is called, coastal. That's it, the natives.

And while we are on the topic, Asclepias oenotherioides, it has at last come to Crumby's attention that Simon says, or rumor has it, that zizotes references the skin sores a person may get from handling the hierba. OK. And from the same source, hierba de zizotes is a documented host for monarch butterflies.

Hmmm. I hope so. I would like to find some monarch caterpillars, or maybe queens on my hierba de zizotes. Dern. Seems like I would have already noticed that.