Cool Spider In My Kitchen

[oscarwylde]

I was reading up on them, and CFC gets full marks, they're spider-eaters. So if you don't like spiders, they're the ones to leave in your house! Can't bite you, so harmless.

One of the great things about being back in the UK (I was living in the US until this time last year) is that nothing is poisonous. You can touch, prod, catch, and general annoy practically anything. OK, we have adders but there are like 7 of them in the whole country. My girlfriend brought me back a giant centipede she found on a field trip while we were in the US, and let me tell you, that thing had a bite! And in Australia is sounds like everything is deadly poisionous!

Cheers,

Neale

I live in australia and i can tell you i see many spiders every day..i probably come across at least a dozen red backs (very deadly) every week and may be a couple of funnel webs (even deadlier) at work ..(i work outside)...garden spiders and daddy long legs (like in your pic) are so commen its not funny ..but it is a nice close up pic .. b t w we also have a lot of snakes ..
don't see them much were i live but higher up the country we have something like the five most deadliest in the world ... scary

 

[nmonks]

Curious. In the US, I thought "daddy long legs" refered to Opiliones (see here) rather than spiders. In the UK, opilionids are known as harvestmen, because (I believe) they are most common during the late summer and autumn. Anyway, they're not spiders, but they are arachnids, and very neat animals they are too. The giveaway with opilionids is that the body is one single segment, where spiders have two segments, a "head" and an "abdomen".

Either way, an object lesson in how variable common names can be compared with scientific ones!

On the topic of arachnids, if you haven't seen sea spiders you've missed out. The species on the British coasts are tiny, around an inch or so across, but the ones from the deep sea and Antarctica can be massive. If you happen to be on the coast this summer, look out for them under seaweeds and rocks, they're very neat beasts, and despite being quite common most people have never seen one. It's not clear if they really are arachnids or something much more primitive. Among their other neat features, they have no body as such, and all their organs including their gonads, are jammed into their eight long legs. Bizarre.

Cheers,

Neale

Daddy long legs are great! Luckily for me in Texas, we have a bunch of them... but that one must be a female with such a plump body. I've only seen them skinnier.

 

[demonmagus]

I was busying myself with the hoe,

 

[denis coghlan]

you should have seen the hoe!

 

[downsouth]

You can touch, prod, catch, and general annoy practically anything.

 

[Dave781]

tanks a lot thanks a lot im goina have nightmares tonight after that story!

 

[denis coghlan]

Continuing on with spider stories, I was in Fiji two years ago and I bumped into this fella. The first picture is of the accommodation that I was staying in. The beach is just in front of the hut (first picture) with one of the best tidal reefs in fiji just 50 meter away. I only got out of the water to eat and sleep!! Anyway back to the spider, the hut to say the least way not insect secure, we had a resident populations of geckos, lizards, mice and all sorts. But this little fella took the cake, (second pic) He was rather large to say the least, he was nearly the size of my hand. My girlfriend nearly went nuts, she climbed into the mosquito net and secured it under the mattress so that nothing could get to her. She then proceeded to tell me to get rid of it!!!!! I have never seen something move so fast as this spider. I couldn’t get rid of it so I lied and say I did, she didn’t sleep well for the next three nights!!

I think it was called a Cocoanut spider!! and this was a small one!!

5 star fiji accomodation

Big ass Cocoanut spider

tanks

 

[Saedcantas]

Nice beastie, we've got squillions of these at work amongst other scarier things (I work in an aquatics and reptile shop )

I have actually been bitten by a very very large female garden spider (Araneus diadematus) and an even bigger giant house spider (Tegenaria gigantea) both were less than enjoyable but it was my own fault for picking them up

 

[fuzzyferret]

I was at work early one morning when I saw a spider on the ceiling. As it was right above my head, I thought I'd catch it and stick it out of the window onto bushes outside. It looked really weird, being extremely shiny and black, with a really round body. I caught it in a glass jar and had a really good look, admiring its red marking underneath!

I mentioned it to my husband, who said it sounded like a black widow! I laughed at him, and looked the critter up on the internet. Sure enough, there it was.

I felt really bad though for putting it outside on the bushes, as it was in spring so there were still a few cold snaps around.

May have come off some bananas that I had in the office, don't know, but I haven't seen the critter again!

 

[timmystood]

If that spider (original picture) - turned up in my house I would die!

 

[moray]

Daddy long legs is one of those incredibly confusing common names for things (we see it so often in fish keeping) Unfortunately different people call different things daddy longlegs.

There's the prementioned harvest men and pholcid house spider and then there is the crane fly (family Tipalidae), these are insects (6 legs, 3 body segments etc.)

The daddy longlegs theme goes on and on, the famous and urban myth

"The daddy-longlegs has the world's most powerful venom, but fortunately its jaws (fangs) are so small that it can't bite you."

Anyway: great spider Nmonks


tanksalot, lovely big fat spider, some sort of huntsman I'm guessing, would love to know it's latin name.

 

[AMS]

I want one of those sea-spiders! Im guessing they havent made their way in the aquarium trade though

 

[Neal]

Why the hell did I read all this post? I'm feeling all itchy now and I won't be able to sleep tonight, the only spider I can put up with is a daddy longlegs, I may be a puff but oh well!

Neal

 

[julia298]

Spiders make me feel if theyre small and 10 metres or more away.

Any closer any fur or hair visible -

Linford Christie style spiders also -

And this is before I reaslised UK spiders DO BITE.

Tuesday night, on my own...I turned the light off, told the dog to jump off the bed, I climbed under the duvet and felt what I thought was a thistle. Pulled back the duvet and saw in the dark a big black blob. Leapt off the end of the bed in one jump shouting something beginning with F.

Light on, just in time to see a BIG, no HUGE spider disappear down the back of the bed.
Moved the bed slightly (very brave IMO) and it disappeared under the bed.



If you want to know what happened next... this is where I really start to feel stupid

Rang my dad, who came round and was MADE to "GET THAT SPIDER FOUND (please) " (Now 12.30am)
Under the bed the *ugger could be seen hanging with its knees nearly touching the floor.
The bed was too heavy to lift (I wasn't coming that close to help) so the bed, which is made in 2 halves had to come apart. The spider finally ended up in the hoover, bagged and dumped in a skip a mile away.

BUT nobody believes it bit me! It was dark! I thought it was a thistle! I could have shared the bed all night with it if I hadn't felt it!

Have checked under the covers every night since Tuesday. No more spiders

 

[OohFeeshy]

daddy longlegs theme goes on and on, the famous and urban myth

"The daddy-longlegs has the world's most powerful venom, but fortunately its jaws (fangs) are so small that it can't bite you."

Mythbusters investigated that one, one of the species (the one with the really thing legs that hangs around in gaages), it's poison isn't deadly at all and they can bite you, as demonstrated by one of them putting their hand in a tube full of them