This photo is a picture a friend of mine took of a giant spider he found in his house. Note the photo was scanned in upside down, the spider is actually clinging to the ceiling. He says it was as big as his hand and by measuring the size of the kernels in the popcorn ceiling and comparing that to the ceiling in my own house, it is indeed a good 6 inches across. We live in central Florida. Can anyone help ID this thing?
No idea what it is but ewww…This is why I’m glad I don’t live in Florida. I hate spiders. Had a fear of them ever since I was about 2 or 3. One of my very earliest memories in life is that of a spider in our basement window that (in my childs-mind) filled the whole window and was about 5 feet across. I remember screaming as I ran up the stairs to my mother.
I believe it is a Wolf Spider. Cite.
Warning: lots of icky spider pictures.
Oh yeah. That’s a wolf spider, all right. I live in central Florida myself, and I’ve encountered the horrifying Fanged Hand of Ickiness more times than I care to remember. Ya wanna know what’s worse than a wolf spider? Those banana spiders. They’re more terrifying than wolfies, despite their smaller size, and they spin big frickin’ webs right where bug galumphing humans like myself would walk into them.
Wait till it’s winter, and they migrate indoors.
Thanks for the leads. After looking around this site some more, I think it’s actually a Huntsman Spider. The second photo from the bottom (a male Huntsman) is especially a good match, and my friend agrees.
I’m a former Central Floridian myself, and I recognized that sum’bitch right away. We always called 'em Housekeeping spiders (or some called them Banana spiders), but those are just other names for the Huntsman spider. I still have nightmares about 'em 23 years after the time I got into the shower with one as a teenager. When they run on the walls, you can hear it! (Now I won’t be able to sleep tonight!):eek:
I remember when I was at a Girl Scouts camping trip in eastern North Carolina, a wolf spider crawled into my mom’s tent. It was a HUGE female, her back crawling with hundreds of little baby spiders. I’ll never forget my mom and the other troop leader running out of the tent, screaming bloody murder. It was a sight to see 
WHY do I keep reading these threads?? :smack:
Man, now I have the willies.
I think they used some of those in the movie Arachnaphobia.
Oh, sweet Jesus, if I saw one of those in my house I would keel over dead. Florida, huh? Good to know.
Of course, the cite that DeVena provided… those pictures were taken right here in Tallahassee, Home of the Really Creepy Spiders. Those wolf spiders, in particular, love cedar and cypress. If you have a lot of that kind of wood in/around your house… you’ve created the perfect habitat for the buggers.
The “banana” spiders are known as the Golden Orb, and thankfully, die out when it cools down, and so do NOT move into the house. I have these starting to spin huge webs all over my yard. The webs can be 8-10 feet in diameter. You do NOT want to be mindlessly doing yard work in the dead of summer in Florida and accidentally stumble into one of those webs.
:: shudder::