  
A number of years ago the region where I lived suffered through weeks of a tent caterpillar infestation. Thousands of them covered trees and the walls and doorways of people's houses, including my own.You couldn't walk into the house without having them fall onto you. They squished messily on the sidewalk as you stepped on them. The caterpillars weren't a danger ... they didn't bite or sting ... they were just disgusting. The birds wouldn't eat them.    They couldn't be avoided; they were everwhere, including the entrance to the school. Everyone was searching for ways to get rid of them.One solution that seemed to work was to spray them with a solution of dish soap and water, which would cause them to fall off whatever surface they were on. The resulting sloppy mess of writhing, soon to expire caterpillars could then be hosed away out of sight. Meanwhile, I chose to find other ways to hasten their demise. Read on. I was fortunate to have a very large supply of real firecrackers, the kind that actually explode; the ones that were a staple of my childhood. These were obtained while travelling through the U.S. where they were abundantly available on and before July 4th. Don't ask. As a child, I had experimented with their use very thoroughly, having blown up cans, ant hills, my mother's pots, apples, numerous plastic toys belonging to my brother, and my shoe. I'd investigated their power to destroy by bundling many of them together to make a far larger explosion, one that would send a small can hurtling many tens of feet into the air. I should point out here that firecrackers were eventually banned in Canada because of the irresponsible use by some wayward youth who tested the effectiveness of firecrackers at blowing off pockets of their friends, and seeing how many fingers they could lose by holding them in their hand as they exploded.
 
There were thousands of caterpillars on the walls and doorway. But I had many hundreds of firecrackers. Enough to do the job.I experimented with delivery methods first. The caterpillars seemed oblivious to the danger, even when taken hostage and being strapped to a fire cracker. I think they were mocking me. Before beginning the battle, I decided to test the effectiveness of the ordnance on a vertical surface by taping one firecracker to the edge of the doorway and measuring the blast radius. This was something I had never done in my childhood, being satisfied with ants, bits of plastic, and various cans and pots flying off in all directions. But now I was prepared to be more scientific.
I made the decision that if I couldn't destroy them, I would humiliate them. 
I prepared a canvas with various mounds of poster paint in assorted colours. My plan was to confine some caterpillars to the canvas, and allow them to move around on the surface, wriggling through the paint, and hopefully creating some 'caterpillar art'.I wasn't hopeful. Caterpillars are not very intelligent ... sort of like cats. I tried painting the feet of one of my cats once to see if she'd make some pleasing paw print trails on the paper I'd laid out. She promptly sat down and licked all the paint off her feet. But she didn't do a great job of it as I discovered later when she jumped on the couch.
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I attached one firecracker to the edge of the doorway and prepared to make some measurements. However, I quickly discovered that the flimsy plastic siding of my house was no match for the power of a firecracker.