TRIGGER WARNING
Arachnophobes may want to skip the videos.
I have never been afraid of spiders. Maybe it’s from reading Charlotte’s Web as a child. But I’ve always found them fascinating.
And now I’m low-key obsessed with Jumping Spiders, spending far too much time watching videos of them on TikTok
and Youtube
They supposedly make good pets, are low maintenance, and friendly. Their enclosures don’t take up much room and are charmingly customizable. But they have a very short life span, only 1 to 3 years. I don’t think I’m emotionally built for annual loss. What are your thoughts on spiders, Deadsplinters? Friend or foe, pet or pest?
I don’t mind nonpoisonous spiders but my wife and daughters are terrified of them. Anytime I hear my name being screamed in the house I can almost guarantee it is to remove a spider. A biologist friend always tells me about the house spider that eats all the other spiders in your house and not to kill them. I’m not exactly sure how I determine the top spider in the house but try to use that excuse when I find a big one to no avail.
So no pet tarantula for you.
Generally speaking, I don’t mind them one way or the other. I do, however, mind when they spin webs that I can see in the house because it looks like we don’t clean, or webs they build right in front of the damned door for me to walk into.
When I was a kid I read a book called “Be Nice to Spiders” which is probably why I have taken my generally hands off approach to them.
I had a friend in college who was both an arachnophobe and had poor eyesight. One time I was in her kitchen and saw a teeny, tiny little spider. I asked her “hey, what’s that?” She said, “what’s what?” I pointed at the countertop and said “that”. She had to get really, really close before she realized “IT’S A FUCKING SPIDER” and jumped halfway across the room. I’m not proud of that one.
I never heard of that book, just watched a YouTube reading of it. I’m going to buy it for my youngest nieces and nephews, thanks!
She also wrote Harry the Dirty Dog, which I always found fascinating because Harry is a pet who just wanders around his regular American town. Which was a thing when it was written — people just let their dogs roam free, and if they pooped on someone’s lawn, got hit by a car, or bit someone, that was just another day for a dog.
I loved Harry. When I was a kid our dogs ran loose like that. One of them was hit by a car or something and it pushed all his teeth out of whack. My siblings and I were crying hysterically and my aunt made my dad take him to an emergency vet where did surgery and gave him braces to wear for several months. It cost a fortune and my dad was pissed, lol.
We love spiders in our house. Have them all over. No killing allowed – if they’re in the way – we just move them. We even had a black widow that lived under one of the porch chairs. She was gigantic. Needless to say – no one sat in that chair while she was alive.
Peacock and jumping spiders are supercute. I will say that tarantulas give me pause though – I think it’s their size.
At my last house we had orb spiders that lived in the landscaping. I loved the huge webs they made. One of my daughter’s friends asked if they were Halloween decorations, lol.
😂 @loveshaq, if my husband hears his name being screamed, then it’s safe for him to assume it is not an emergency and that I’ve come across a spider.
We have a no kill spider policy in our home. He catches and releases them. I’ve selfishly been teaching my kids not to be afraid of spiders…since women tend to live longer than men, I’m going to need them to help me when my husband passes.
We call all spiders “Frank” thanks to this book: Frank the Seven Legged Spider.
Aww, that one’s cute too!
That’s cool. I love the Wing Luke museum.
I went to the Wing Luke Museum to buy some kid books this morning. It was closed and only opens on Thursday at 10. Got coconut buns and roast pork belly for my trouble. Not a bad morning.
I love all the food places around there! I went 2 years in a row w/ my kids on field trips with elementary schools. It was such a blast to expose all the kids to the rich Asian culture we have in that area.
One of my sisters hates spiders all the damn time.
Me? I’ve made peace with them. They kill all the bugs and don’t annoy me with their webs, I let them live.
Another reason to like spiders. You never know when one might give you super powers.
Never been afraid of spiders. Growing up, we had wolf spiders sometimes in the house and those things can get HUGE. Like up to 3” across occasionally. But they’re great beneficial predators. Also there were lots of black widows (mainly in the yard, I think we only ever found 2 in the house). We had jumping spiders too! We let them stay as “wild” pets in the living room near the computer table. They loved to chase the animations on screen and the mouse cursor. It was so cool. Like this (not my video):
In my current house, though, we have brown recluses. Lots of them. Unfortunately they are too dangerous and too numerous so I do kill those when they cross my path. But I always feel bad about it. Occasionally I will find a wild tarantula roaming the yard. Those are facinating to see. Also I have zigzag orb weavers outside. They make interesting webs and are pretty to look at.
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That video is really cool. When my daughter was an undergrad she was doing bat research with a postdoc. She’d set bug traps out at night and collect them in the morning to go through with him. One day she found a huge wolf spider and was like, “ uh, dude, there’s a really big spider in here. “ He was annoyed and told here not to be a big baby. She answered that it was a REALLY big spider. He stopped what he was doing to come and see and let out a shriek, lol. They are good though, it was the first one she’d seen.
I’m not sure if we have Brown Recluse here. I’ll have to ask her. We don’t have tarantulas but we do have scorpions in some parts of the state, which most people are unaware of. And they creep me out.
Oh yes scorpions are all over here. I usually catch them in a glass and put them outside. If I leave them inside the cats hunt & kill them (and end up with a swollen paw for a day or two). I’ve been stung twice in my life now and it’s soooooo painful.
A friend of mine was bitten by what his Dr thinks was a brown recluse. He developed an ulcer and necrosis on his leg and needed to be hospitalized. Don’t fuck with those guys.
Yikes! I hope he made a full recovery.
He did!
@HammerZeitgeist Ack! I’m glad your friend recovered. That’s what I’ve heard. And so, even though I hate to do it, I squish any I come across. And there are SO MANY here. I never get dressed or use a towel without shaking it out and looking it over first. Shoes get tapped out before putting them on. Never reach for something anywhere you can’t see.
Always liked that tune.
I am seriously freaked out by spiders. I can deal with Daddy Longlegs, but pretty much any other spider gets squished if it’s in the house. Preferably by someone who is not me!
I will never, ever get over the time I was taking a bath in the morning after staying over at my BFF’s… there was something tickling the back of my arm. I thought it was a loose hair (I have long hair and shed like a cat). It wasn’t a hair. It was a furry black spider the size of my thumb. I screamed on an INDRAWN breath so loud that Other-Husband came running up from downstairs. He’s a country boy, grew up on an old farm with various half-collapsed barns and all that, so he’s not really afraid of any bugs at all. Even HE was freaked out by the size of that spider! It’s been months, and I still move everything around and check all the corners before I take a bath there, now.
I think I’d be startled too if I was relaxing in the tub and a spider decided to join me, lol.
i like lucas the spider
Well now I like Lucas too!
I was not fond of spiders until I did fieldwork in Belize back in the early 00s and I had a cabana which was buggy because you can only do so much to keep bugs out of cheap wooden cabanas in the jungle.
Anyways, I had 2 wolf spiders or tarantulas (honestly I don’t know the difference, but the smaller one was bigger than the palm of my hand), Wolfy and Foxy, that lived in my cabana. Foxy was orange and liked to hang out on the screened window near the ceiling and eat moths or whatever. Wolfy was brown and mostly lived on the floor.
I didn’t kill them at first because I was like wow can we coexist because if I try to kill you and fail you’re gonna come after me….
And then I noticed a pattern of finding a dead scorpion and seeing that either Wolfy or Foxy lost a leg. So they became my favorite roommates ever. I found several dead scorpions over the course of that summer.
Yep, I’d much rather share quarters with spiders than scorpions. To Wolfy and Foxy! 🍻
Spiders are NOT friends!!!!
They are only temporary allies, in that; “The Enemy of my enemy is my friend” sort of way!!!!!
Otherwise they are evil creatures** with altogether tooooooooooooooooooo many legs!!!!!
Eta; and that Universal Enemy is, of course, Mosquitos!!!!!
**The ONLY exception to this rule *WAS* Charlotte.
But she DIED, and i’ma look sideways at even her daughters, ‘cuz she may have been their Momma, but they *ain’t* HER!🤨🤨🤨
Hahahaha! I think their multiple little legs are cute!
I was terrified of spiders as a child–daddy long legs creeped me out, and they were allovertheplace when I was a little girl, because most of my family lived in old houses, and I would get to ride along with Dad in his milk trucks sometimes–meaning I was going in & out of dairy barns, milking sheds, and olllllllld creameries, with dusty basements that had plenty of cobwebs…
Annnnnd as a result, even the little-bitty-baby-spiders that were around 1/4″ across (including allllll those legs!😉) used to send the Wee Emm running away, screaming bloody murder, because I was SO scared of all of them😄😆🤣
We all have our phobias. I am not fond of sneks.