Spiders

[ksaves2]

I was remembering when I was a young kid that my "future" high school biology teacher lived off to the side of the house where I lived. He had a son who was a bit older than me and he got excited one time with one of his dad's pets. It was a big mother, female tarantula. Greg took her out on a table one time and I'll never forget "my spider" interaction. I was a young kid and was fearless. His dad raised her as a spiderling and she didn't mind being handled by people! I was a stupid kid and put my arm down and this big, mother tarantula started walking up my arm. I didn't mind as she was so sedate. She stopped at my elbow and I was talking and petting her. To my amazement, she started rolling around and liked being petted gently! They have two big fangs at their mouths too but she was so friendly and didn't think of biting me!
In a Catholic college I attended a biology professor had a pet female tarantula. She was just as friendly with human contact so I got to "pet" a tarantula again later on.

In a "James Bond" movie, they showed a "poisonous spider" crawling up Sean Connery that was a tarantula! I saw the movie later on T.V. and shirked about it as I know tarantulas can be good friends if they've been acclimated to people.

Yeah, don't go after wild ones but ones raised from babies with human contact, they can be good pets. The problem is providing them with the "bugs" they need to survive.
Once they look at you with those eight eyes with affection one will be hooked!!

Kurt

 

[Azamiryou]

I saw a lot of them in the wild growing up in southern NM. I have seen a few in northern NM in the countryside near Santa Fe.

I've never seen one here in the Albuquerque foothills. But I know they must be here, as we see tarantula hawks in our yard all the time.

(Tarantula hawks are also quite tame, and I handled them all the time as a kid because "they don't sting people". Turns out they do, sometimes, and you don't want to be on the receiving end of that! It's second only to the bullet ant on the Schmidt Sting Pain Index. I can say from personal experience it is like being electrocuted, burned alive, and having all of your skin flayed off at the same time, leaving you incapable of doing anything except lie in the fetal position and scream for several minutes. And then it goes away like it never happened. And if you're a kid, none of the grown-ups will believe you because "they don't sting people.")

 

[Hobie1dog]

I'll take a spider over a snake, any day;

 

[SolarYellow]

Killed a brown widow today.

 

[lr64]

I saw a lot of them in the wild growing up in southern NM. I have seen a few in northern NM in the countryside near Santa Fe.

I've never seen one here in the Albuquerque foothills. But I know they must be here, as we see tarantula hawks in our yard all the time.

(Tarantula hawks are also quite tame, and I handled them all the time as a kid because "they don't sting people". Turns out they do, sometimes, and you don't want to be on the receiving end of that! It's second only to the bullet ant on the Schmidt Sting Pain Index. I can say from personal experience it is like being electrocuted, burned alive, and having all of your skin flayed off at the same time, leaving you incapable of doing anything except lie in the fetal position and scream for several minutes. And then it goes away like it never happened. And if you're a kid, none of the grown-ups will believe you because "they don't sting people.")

I used to work at a place that had what seemed to be hundreds of very large wasps living in holes in the lawn next to the parking lot. I doubt they were tarantula hawks this far north, unless other kinds of spiders will do. I never heard of anyone being stung, though.

 

[Azamiryou]

... very large wasps living in holes in the lawn next to the parking lot. I doubt they were tarantula hawks this far north

Cicada Killer Wasps, I'd wager. They also don't sting people. But when they do, apparently it's not too bad — according to Schmidt, it hurts, but not as much as a honeybee sting.

Getting back on topic, I love spiders! I'm not into handling them, but I do like observing them, and I like the way they help with pest control. They are beautiful creatures. I've never handled a tarantula, but I would if someone offered to let me hold their pet.

There are a lot of black widows around here, and I mostly just leave them be. That is, unless they choose to live somewhere that we'd be likely to come into contact with them by accident. We've had several set up shop in gate handles. Sorry, nope, you'll have to go!

 

[OverTheTop]

At least we don't see spiders crossing the road over here. They are generally small enough or don't bother. Those big black ones you have in NM are scary.

 

[jadebox]

I like spiders.

 

[Azamiryou]

I like spiders.View attachment 661936

That spider looks very surprised. I guess I would be, too!

 

[cerving]

One of my nieces had a wedding last year at a hilltop venue, during the night-before get-together there was a big tarantula wandering through the patio. A lot of people just freaked out... I scooped it up with a paper plate and took it into the bushes. They're pretty cool spiders.

 

[SolarYellow]

I’ve been up in the San Gabriel mountains during a tarantula migration. Every 15 feet or so in any direction, there’s another one. All walking in the same direction. Creepy and cool at the same time.

 

[teepot]

I had met Glenda only a week or two before. She wanted me to with her to get a Tarantula. I remember looking in the back seat to make sure he was still in his container. His name was Herman. She still had him a couple of years later when we got married. He was ok being handled. We had him for years. Then one day we found him dead for no apparent reason. Didn't get another one. Here in Nevada I have seen them in the wild. Babies to adults. When I see a small black spider I look to see if it's hairy because then it's a Tarantula. I see them often. If it's shiny it's probably a Black Widow. I used to kill them on sight. Now I leave them alone because the eat the darn crickets. I have two spider rockets.

 

[tsmmiller]

Spiders don't bug me and I find them rather fascinating.
As kids in southern Idaho, summers we would each pick one location that a banded garden spider had set up as home. We would then feed our spider to see who could get the largest by summers end.
As each of us kids fed our three spiders they had more than abundant food resulting in lots of babies produced so our property was a mega home for thousands of banded garden spiders.
Of course we also had those pesky black widows. I've been bitten three times by those. Unpleasant for sure.

 

[KenECoyote]

Recently I've been watching short videos of jumping spiders and the cuteness is off the scale!

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/S2ZB2wcY4XbzyFur/?mibextid=Mk4v2M

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/sKD4qgQppvwzrcoV/?mibextid=Mk4v2M

(Sorry, videos only appear to be on Facebook. )

 

[cls]

I played guitar in a pick up band called The Tarantulas. lotsa fun, folksy sing along camping type stuff.

 

[Pem Tech]

Funny this thread should come up....
Three weekends ago I woke up with three red bumps on my forehead. Thinking they were zits I just ignored them, until Monday. Monday they were huge and feverish, I was lightheaded, dizzy and would have failed a field sobriety test. Still no pain but I had to leave work a few hours early I felt so bad. The bumps got bigger and I felt a bit better over the next few days. Then Thursday struck.....
Each bite had a necrotic area in the center. You keep telling yourself, "It will get better soon", but you really know differently. By the next weekend the necrosis was still increasing. To the doctor on Monday. Looks like I was bitten three times by a brown recluse. This is weekend three and the areas are healing, finally. They look terrible, big black spots on my forehead. So, I'll give a thumbs down to spiders in the house but a thumbs up for outdoor spiders. Eat them skeeters boys!

 

[ksaves2]

Funny this thread should come up....
Three weekends ago I woke up with three red bumps on my forehead. Thinking they were zits I just ignored them, until Monday. Monday they were huge and feverish, I was lightheaded, dizzy and would have failed a field sobriety test. Still no pain but I had to leave work a few hours early I felt so bad. The bumps got bigger and I felt a bit better over the next few days. Then Thursday struck.....
Each bite had a necrotic area in the center. You keep telling yourself, "It will get better soon", but you really know differently. By the next weekend the necrosis was still increasing. To the doctor on Monday. Looks like I was bitten three times by a brown recluse. This is weekend three and the areas are healing, finally. They look terrible, big black spots on my forehead. So, I'll give a thumbs down to spiders in the house but a thumbs up for outdoor spiders. Eat them skeeters boys!

A brown recluse has a nasty bite with enzymes that destroy tissue and spreads out destroying tissue as it goes. The pain is pretty bad so the patients come in pretty quickly. The sooner the better as I had to refer to a surgeon right away and they would have to resect the area out. That was the standard back then. If it was large enough, they'd have to do skin grafting.
A long time ago in the early days of the internet, I saw a guy that had a cardboard pen made up and was ACTUALLY playing with a brown recluse and petting it while lecturing about the species! He mentioned that they respond to pressure so if they get under someones clothes or shoes they don't like the pressure of the clothes and will bite and evenomate. The bites can look pretty nasty if the person doesn't come in right away. A sleeping bag might be another place they might hide.

 

[ksaves2]

I'll take a spider over a snake, any day;

Not me, I'll go with a friendly snake all the time. I was spading an extra row in the garden for more sweet corn and felt a bit "odd'. I turned around and an uncoiled 7 foot black racer was upright and totally straight out. I remember watching Steve Irwin the crocodile hunter saying if you're by a snake and it's uncoiled it's totally relaxed. I squatted down and grabbed the head and it gently coiled around my arm without appearing agitated at all. They're not poisonous.

I took it into the house and showed it to my wife asking if I could "keep" my new pet. She wasn't used to snakes "yet" and had a meltdown I got a big laugh out of! I took the snake outside and I let her go where I found her. I do think it might have been someone's pet that either got out or they released. I think the snake was female as she was quite large. She hung around and watched me then slithered off. Never saw her again though I would have liked to.

Snakes in the early spring started warming themselves on the front porch cement pad of our house in the early and late mornings. It was a "snake" convention! My wife came home and called me saying the porch is covered in snakes! Looked like Garter and Black Racer snakes and they were getting along. I took a look out the door and none of them were poisonous. I went out and gently brushed them away with my foot and they slithered away.
I lectured my wife about snakes and she took to brushing them away with her foot thereafter without getting spastic about it anymore.

Suffice to say, not all snakes are friendly. On three occasions I had young garter snakes get stuck in my storage shed. I was going the do the hand thing but as soon as I got close they started hissing and striking in my direction. I didn't know they could hiss but they were obviously agitated. Time to go to plan B. I reached for a leaf rake and gradually herded them out the door. This happened 3 times. I think it's a self preservation thing. The smaller the wild snake, the more aggressive it can be.
They eat vermin and I had exposure to snakes when I was a kid, handled some friendly ones and like them. I've been hoping to find or get close to a pygmy rattler the Massasauga as they might be endangered in Illinois. I was told years ago if one sights one they should report it to the IDNR so they can keep track of them. There's other rattlers in Illinois but I don't live in the right area for them. If heard a rattle, I'd stop, try to sight the snake and back away.

 

[SolarYellow]

I've seen a few that might have been cottonmouths on the bayou here, but anything that could have been one of those skedaddles pretty quick. Others I've seen well enough to ID have been a Texas patch nose snake, Texas brown snake, rough green snake, and diamondback water snake. All good guys. Only two copperheads in nearly a dozen years living here.

 

[Pem Tech]

A brown recluse has a nasty bite with enzymes that destroy tissue and spreads out destroying tissue as it goes. The pain is pretty bad so the patients come in pretty quickly. The sooner the better as I had to refer to a surgeon right away and they would have to resect the area out. That was the standard back then. If it was large enough, they'd have to do skin grafting.
A long time ago in the early days of the internet, I saw a guy that had a cardboard pen made up and was ACTUALLY playing with a brown recluse and petting it while lecturing about the species! He mentioned that they respond to pressure so if they get under someones clothes or shoes they don't like the pressure of the clothes and will bite and evenomate. The bites can look pretty nasty if the person doesn't come in right away. A sleeping bag might be another place they might hide.

This is what had me VERY concerned. A skin graft on my face! How bad would it be, how far would the necropsy spread, would Mary Anne ever get off that island?
I am secretly terrified of spiders, which I think is quite normal anthropologically, but I refuse to submit to that fear. In the same way that I'm terrified of heights but love roller coasters and repelling. Last fall, on the pistol range I felt a good sized something start crawling up the inside of my pant leg. My wife and daughters would have shucked trou in a heart beat, and probably burnt them. Anyway, it spiraled my leg all the way to my waistline, biting as it went. I kept calmly swatting till it stopped. Once home I was relieved to discover it was a wolf spider which are non-venomous. However, they have some decent sized fangs. Yikes at the fang marks!

 

[ksaves2]

I believe the poisonous snakes in Illinois live in the river bottom land and I'm not too close for that. I don't go out triapsing around in swamps anymore to catch tadpoles either. My lovely wife caught some tadpoles and one survived long enough to make it to adulthood. I took it down to the pond where is was caught and released it as a full grown frog..

 

[Rocket-Fan]

Recently I've been watching short videos of jumping spiders and the cuteness is off the scale!

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/S2ZB2wcY4XbzyFur/?mibextid=Mk4v2M

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/sKD4qgQppvwzrcoV/?mibextid=Mk4v2M

(Sorry, videos only appear to be on Facebook. )

We have a lot of jumping spiders here on my property. They are cute.

 

[Glasspack]

I believe the poisonous snakes in Illinois live in the river bottom land and I'm not too close for that. I don't go out triapsing around in swamps anymore to catch tadpoles either. My lovely wife caught some tadpoles and one survived long enough to make it to adulthood. I took it down to the pond where is was caught and released it as a full grown frog..

You meant Venomous .....NOT Poisonous

 

[bad_idea]

Funny this thread should come up....
Three weekends ago I woke up with three red bumps on my forehead. Thinking they were zits I just ignored them, until Monday. Monday they were huge and feverish, I was lightheaded, dizzy and would have failed a field sobriety test. Still no pain but I had to leave work a few hours early I felt so bad. The bumps got bigger and I felt a bit better over the next few days. Then Thursday struck.....
Each bite had a necrotic area in the center. You keep telling yourself, "It will get better soon", but you really know differently. By the next weekend the necrosis was still increasing. To the doctor on Monday. Looks like I was bitten three times by a brown recluse. This is weekend three and the areas are healing, finally. They look terrible, big black spots on my forehead. So, I'll give a thumbs down to spiders in the house but a thumbs up for outdoor spiders. Eat them skeeters boys!

Wow. Get well soon!

 

[Sandy H.]

This is what had me VERY concerned. A skin graft on my face! How bad would it be, how far would the necropsy spread, would Mary Anne ever get off that island?
I am secretly terrified of spiders, which I think is quite normal anthropologically, but I refuse to submit to that fear. In the same way that I'm terrified of heights but love roller coasters and repelling. Last fall, on the pistol range I felt a good sized something start crawling up the inside of my pant leg. My wife and daughters would have shucked trou in a heart beat, and probably burnt them. Anyway, it spiraled my leg all the way to my waistline, biting as it went. I kept calmly swatting till it stopped. Once home I was relieved to discover it was a wolf spider which are non-venomous. However, they have some decent sized fangs. Yikes at the fang marks!

I got bitten by a brown recluse a few years ago. I didn't know I was bitten until the next day when taking a shower, I felt a bump, scrubbed it and later noticed a decent amount of blood in the shower. It was my right lower calf, as I assumed ingrown hair/zit and didn't think about it anymore.

Next day, my leg was pretty itchy in that area, so I asked my wife to look at the back of my leg, as it was just not a place I could see well. 2 tiny pokes and a quarter sized red spot. Put on Benedryl gel and went to work. Over the next few days, the spot kept getting bigger and was getting a blue/purple color around the edge. Looked up possibilities and brown recluse bite pictures matched pretty well.

I had heard these were extremely dangerous, but due to the internet searches it sounded like they were not treated the same way today as they were in the old days, so I basically just took to scrubbing the living heck out of the back of my leg every day. I managed to get a really bad area that was simply put gross and itchy as crazy - probably about 3" wide x 6" long. It was nasty for 5-6 months. A few years later, its fine, but there was a lot of misery during that time.

It was absolutely a mistake for me to believe the internet and self-treat by just scrubbing to get rid of dead skin. If I ever suspect a brown recluse bite again, I will absolutely seek professional care, even if it is a few days later. My mistake was believing they could only do something to help without surgery within the first few hours. I'm sure whatever a doctor would have done would have been better than what I did.

Regretfully, now all spiders (except writing spiders, as I can easily recognize what they are) die. I don't like killing things, but I am not going through that again if I can help it. We also had a pretty big black widow season here this year for some reason. Not a fan.

 

[SolarYellow]

Last fall, on the pistol range I felt a good sized something start crawling up the inside of my pant leg. My wife and daughters would have shucked trou in a heart beat, and probably burnt them. Anyway, it spiraled my leg all the way to my waistline, biting as it went. I kept calmly swatting till it stopped. Once home I was relieved to discover it was a wolf spider which are non-venomous. However, they have some decent sized fangs. Yikes at the fang marks!

Wow, good to know. We get some solid wolf spiders around here. I like them and think of them as good guys, but am still a little cautious just because of the size.

We have a ton of plexippus paykulli around here. Cool little things. Sometimes, if we swat a fly without gooshing it, we'll find one of these little guys and leave it near him. Fun to watch him attack it.

 

[teepot]

When we first moved to Pahrump and the landscaping was done when I went outside at night with a headlight on I kept seeing little blue sparkles. After several months of seeing the blue sparkles I wanted to know what they were. I saw one and walked to where it was. It was a spider. Now when I go outside with a headlight on I see dozens of blue sparkles. Last night I saw a green sparkle. Anybody else see the spiders eyes reflecting light around your place?

 

[kenstarr]

I have a weak spot for spiders and snakes. I don't like "bugs", we can safely say. Spiders eat bugs. Therefore I like spiders. Those little cute garden spiders are absolutely adorable! One time I went into a crawl space and there were hundreds of spiders, all the same brand. Normally I don't see spiders in crawl spaces because they don't live where there's not a food supply. No idea what they were eating. Anyway, I went down and they didn't give me any trouble and I didn't give them any trouble so I figured we were cool. Liking spiders doesn't mean I particularly enjoy them crawling on me.
Ken

 

[jadebox]

We live in a wooded area so spiders getting into our house is not an uncommon experience. In order to safely relocate them back outside we bought a special tool from Amazon. It works well:

https://www.amazon.com/My-Critter-Catcher-Spider-Insect/dp/B0192MB5RS/

 

[KenECoyote]

I have a weak spot for spiders and snakes. I don't like "bugs", we can safely say. Spiders eat bugs. Therefore I like spiders. Those little cute garden spiders are absolutely adorable! One time I went into a crawl space and there were hundreds of spiders, all the same brand. Normally I don't see spiders in crawl spaces because they don't live where there's not a food supply. No idea what they were eating. Anyway, I went down and they didn't give me any trouble and I didn't give them any trouble so I figured we were cool. Liking spiders doesn't mean I particularly enjoy them crawling on me.
Ken

A video I saw yesterday on Zebra Jumping spiders noted that over half of their diet were mosquitoes! (Observed in Nebraska.)