Spiders in the shower! (1 Viewer)

[Justin Lane]

At my house spiders always flock to only one shower for some strange reason. I think it has to do with the whitish tile that lines the walls. If I see one I usually just let them outside.
Now Hornets, they are an entirely different story. Like Larry I was attacked as a kid just playing on the sidewalk. Stung over 30 times. Any nest around my house gets destroyed. They are too tempermental to be around dwellings.
J

 

[Scott H]

Hmm, you guys were 'playing' with Brown Recluse spiders? Obviously you never got bit. They have put me in the emergency room on two occassions, years apart... Once in Colorado Springs, and again in St. Louis. When your blood pressure is through the roof, it's hard to breathe, unbelievable swelling, and the word amputation is uttered by a doctor, you take that little spider seriously. I also personally know of two deaths resulting from their bites.
I have a storage unit in L.A. full of stuff, and unfortunately well occupied by big Black Widows. I dread moving everything out of it...
Ironically, most spiders don't freak me out too much.
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[NathanP]

Ewww...
Someone mentioned fluffy kittens..
The only good things about cats are:
1. you can drop them from anywhere and they'll survive
2. when dropping them from anywhere you can make a nice little parachute for them.
3. they taste good with a little catsup and mustard
Dogs rule!
They're so cuddley and cute!
they serve a purpose and do useful things like killing bad guys and herding sheep..
ohh, and going hunting with you.
Spiders and all other "creeping things" are still gross!
Nathan
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[Julie K]

NathanP,
If you think spiders are gross, just pray you never see a hellgrammite

Seriously, I've never found any part of the natural world gross. It's just all too fascinating to be gross.
Like many others here, I too allow a reasonable number of spiders in my house. They are mostly unobtrusive and I like how they eat insects.
Cats are nice too. They have a very different personality from other domesticated animals because they are derived from solitary animals instead of pack or herd animals. And they certainly aren't useless as anyone with a rodent problem will attest. They also eat insects.
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"Some people think I'm over-prepared, paranoid...maybe even a little crazy. But they never met any pre-Cambrian life forms, did they?"

 

[Jim_F]

Spiders are the "cats" of the arthropod world. I'd rather have them in my house than cats, though. My birds feel the same way.

 

[NickSo]

agh.. seeing a spider bigger than 1.5CM makes me scream like a girl...

One time at a condo i have, i opened the curtain and out comes this 3 CM wide spider...... ugh, just looking at it makes me shudder... that same place was also attacked by black ants recently... Some genius renter left a bag of sugar open in a cupoard... ugh... ants evertyhwere... but not on carpet or anything, so it was bearable.. but then i had a party there, and left a couple cans of pepsi out for a week.. i went back a week later to clean up, i take some cans away, and all i see is a swarm of these nasty buggers... then i realized some of the cans werent finished.. BASTARD FRIENDS...

I poured out the ones that were full, out comes a river of ants (not alot, but still sickening)... THey're gone now, maybe we drained away the queen.. WHEW..
Theres a guy renting it right now, he's seen much worse.. hes from texas, and he's amazed you can leave the back door open without fear of poisonous snakes or spiders crawiling into the house... a few ants wont bug him... BUt they should be gone...
Ugh.. thats my bug story

 

[Paul_D]

A friend once put one of those fake plastic tarantulas on my pillow while I was sleeping, knowing full well that my biggest phobia was spiders. The neighbours could hear the screams the next morning.
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[Julie K]

I've got a book recommendation for everyone in the thread:
The Red Hourglass by Gordon Grice.
Grice details, in very lyrical and entrancing language, the lives of seven predators living around him: the black widow, tarantula, mantid, pig, dog, rattlesnake, and recluse spider.
Of course, those of us who like the creepy-crawlies will love the book. Grice loves the crawlies too and every word in the book reflects this. But I feel even those who hate and fear the crawlies should read the book. Even though Grice details such things as the horrors of an untreated black widow bite, the wonder of these creatures shines through. And while true love for these creatures may not result, by understanding the lives of these animals and by reading about them from a devoted fan, the fear that they generate naturally decreases. Understanding and admiration are the natural enemies of fear.
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"Some people think I'm over-prepared, paranoid...maybe even a little crazy. But they never met any pre-Cambrian life forms, did they?"

 

[Jin E]

She has been there for about 2 months and in that time she has mated with and eaten at least 2 tiny males.

Sounds like a gal I used to date... Anyhoo...
When I was in High School my bedroom was outside the house. You had to open the door to my bedroom and the sliding glass door to the kitchen was immediatly to the left. One morning while half asleep making my morning trip to the bathroom to get ready for shool I was greeted by a 3" diameter garden spider right in the face. He had spun his web in the opening for the sliding glass door. I was literally eyeball to eyeball with him. I gave myself a bloody nose smacking him off my face. I did a little dance outside on the pack porch tearing my clothes off swatting away the strands of the spider web with my dad in the kitchen watching in wonder through the sliding glass door.
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-Jin
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[Jay H]

Anybody know how much an overnight FedEx package to London, England area costs from the states? Hey Paul, what's your address...I'd like to see if I can hear your scream over here in the states! Just make sure you send it back!.
BTW, us tarantula keepers have a neat-o way of propagating the species.. it's by way of "overnight carriers" People with gravid females advertise (oh the net is such a wonderful tool) and anybody with a male will literally loan out the male by overnight carrier to the female until after the copulation. Then the guy gets overnighted back to the owner if he doesn't get eaten! It's like a dating service for tarantulas... And they are actually dating more than I am...
Jay
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[Julie K]

Spider dating service?

Actually, that's really cool. Tell me, though, do the owners of the males later get the pick of the litter?

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"Some people think I'm over-prepared, paranoid...maybe even a little crazy. But they never met any pre-Cambrian life forms, did they?"
[Edited last by Julie K on October 01, 2001 at 08:40 AM]

 

[Jay H]

Usually, there's something worked out in the deal... spiderlings are generally many and captive bred s'lings survive at a much higher rate than wild bred ones. They're really cute when there's hundreds of legs all over the place and they're all crawling around and just having a party of a time.
Jay
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[Marianne]

anybody with a male will literally loan out the male by overnight carrier to the female until after the copulation. Then the guy gets overnighted back to the owner if he doesn't get eaten!

Sounds good to me!

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Marianne

 

[Steve Christou]

Marianne, hmmmm tsk tsk.

Hey you all still talking about spiders here people right?
I haven't been following the thread all the way, just read Marianne's post, and I am shocked at the sexual metaphors, I had to double check to see if it was one of my threads.
ps. Got bitten by a female spider recently.......
[Edited last by Steve Christou on October 01, 2001 at 05:47 PM]

 

[Josh LeClair]

and anybody with a male will literally loan out the male by overnight carrier to the female until after the copulation. Then the guy gets overnighted back to the owner if he doesn't get eaten!

That has to freak the guys who are delivering handling the package, hearing something big crawling around in it, I wonder if someone has ever lost a spider to a carrier stomping on the box after hearing it crawl around.
As for the guy with the storage unit in LA full of black widows. Unless your allergic to a black widow bite at least be safe in the knowledge that they aren't deadly or all that dangerous. Not a great spider to be bitten by but not as bad as most people think.
They still scare the crap out of me though. Every time I go out to my car in the morning there are always at least 3 of them under it. On top of that my bathroom window only has a screen in it (no actual glass or anything there, just the screen) and they always get in through there, not fun grabbing the bar of soap and having a black widow on it.

 

[Jay H]

Marianne, unfortunately, it's sometimes impossible to find the father because the female can store a male's sperm up to a month or so, so you can have suddenly expecting mommy spiders a month after the act. Makes it hard for the spider judicial system to determine child support!
Josh, the packages aren't exactly labelled "killer spider inside, beware of air holes" they are basically labelled as any other live animal like "livestock." Plus, the spiders don't make the same kind of scratching sounds a cat or dog would if put in a box and shipped. Although Nermal of garfield fame always got shipped to "Abbudabi" the tarantulas get put in a small pill box with some cotton for moisture and small airholes and put in a box. They're very quiet, i.e. they don't bark!

...and unless the return address is like "spiders plus", it looks just like anything else UPS'ed around, like fish, UPS delivers fish to fish stores all the time. I got my tarantulas from a place called PetcenterUSA.
Finally, certain overnight carriers do have rules and stuff forbidding anything venomous, like FedEx, so that is why we use Airborne Express. Even though nobody has ever been killed by a tarantula, it's still classified as being venomous.
Jay
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[Mikael Soderholm]

They're really cute when there's hundreds of legs all over the place and they're all crawling around and just having a party of a time.

Right, sound like a riot

The only thing I can think of that would be worse than a spider would eb hundreds of them, brrrr.
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/Mikael
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[Scott H]

quote: As for the guy with the storage unit in LA full of black widows. Unless your allergic to a black widow bite at least be safe in the knowledge that they aren't deadly or all that dangerous. Not a great spider to be bitten by but not as bad as most people think.[/quote]
I'll be prudent, and wear gloves and such... But still, considering my track record with Brown Recluse spiders I'm certain that the Black Widows will concoct some covert spider plan to take me out... And of course I'm prob allergic to the bite...
But it's like snakes and bears and mountain lions, if you are thinking about them and looking out you'll be fine, but when you're careless you get busted...
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[Edited last by Scott H on October 02, 2001 at 08:07 PM]

 

[Jason Merrick]

the packages aren't exactly labelled "killer spider inside, beware of air holes" they are basically labelled as any other live animal like "livestock."

Somehow I doubt the UPS guy is going to mistake it for a cow.
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[Jay H]

Moooooo! how about genetic engineered Micro-Cows?
Livestock is an umbrella term, and we take the definitely very liberally!
Jay
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