Oh Please You're Fucking Kidding Me (Spiders & Me)

[Stoid]

I’ve bitched about spiders here before. As a gardener, I know that generally speaking, spiders are my friends and allies.

Except spiders that can bite me.

And hurt me.

And because they can do this they scare the shit outta me and piss me off.

But I’ve learned to accept the fact that because I live in the San Fernando Valley, because I have a big patio and yard, because I’m busy and a bit of a hoarder and not really good about constantly cleaning everything outside and moving things around… black widows are going to be a feature of my life. I know they are there, and that there are lots of them. I never touch ANYTHING without gloves on, particularly if my hand is going to be touching anything I can’t see first (under rims, behind stuff). I am constantly vigilant about not doing stupid things that will get me bitten. (Every bee sting I’ve ever experienced in my life, about 6, were as a result of my accidentally touching the bee. I hear spider bites are a similar story.) I almost always bang on my composters for 15 seconds or so before I open them to let all the critters know I’m coming and to hide.

I am very grateful to the black widows because they have the genetic decency to be extraordinarily easy to spot (at least when they are mature… the babies have slipped into my house and be way up close and the only reason I know is because the shape was alarming and I researched. Widow babies are striped, the sneaky little fuckers.) and, if one goes in for seeing the beauty in stuff that can hurt you, they are actually beautiful in their special jet&blood and big-butt way.

So I was going into the composter today, and I didn’t bang, I just yanked off the top and of course, a big fat black widow was hanging there and was freaked out, because the web was partially attached to the lid I just yanked off. So I went and got some spider killer. Sorry, Ladies, but you only get to live if I can’t see you, that’s the rule. You hang your pretty big red belly in my face, you’re going down.

I come back and drench the old gal in Spider Death Juice and watch her die. Slowly. Which I was a little bit sad about but oh well.

So then I go to do what I started to do, which is to stir the compost a bit. I grab the nearest pitchfork and plunge it in. It’s then when I notice the spiderweb around the handle of the pitchfork and that the handle is hollow and the hollow area is Web Central. Well, I know that widows dont’ build webs that way, too dense and small. But I don’t want to be handling any tool that has a spider in the handle, I’m just that unreasonable.

So, since I happened to have the Spider Death Juice at hand, I squirted a bunch in the handle and set it aside.

I look a few minutes later and sure enough, there’s a big-ish spider on the handle now, obviously attempting to cope with the effects of Spider Death Juice.

Hmmm. Interesting spider.

Looks familiar-ish.

I watch it for a long time. Look as close as I dare.

I watch it die.

Then I go inside and do a little googling.

OH YOU ARE FUCKING KIDDING ME, RIGHT? In the process of killing a big fat fucking black widow, I IDLY, spritz some spider juice on an innocuous looking web that is located inconveniently and it turns out to be a FUCKING BROWN RECLUSE??? SERIOUSLY???

What is this, some fucking cosmic joke???

FUCK!

FUCFUCKFUCK.

GOD FUCK!

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK

fuck.

Yeah, I know, THAT one is dead, but nature’s tiniest denizens aren’t like lions or bears. If you found one bear in your backyard in the San Fernando Valley, well, it’s almost certainly the only bear you’re going to run across. No, when it comes to the little ones, if you’ve seen one, you definitely have NOT seen them all!

FUCK.

GODDAMN IT.

[lissener]

There are a lot of spiders that look similar to the Brown Recluse. Most of them are not.

[Stoid]

Yeah, I know. I was hoping that was going to be the case. But the two pictures on the bottom could have been taken of exactly the spider I killed. I was looking at it very carefully.

[Audrey_Levins]

The OP makes me uncomfortable. Like, squirmy paranoid uncomfortable.

One of the many reasons I Hate Nature.

I scream a lot louder if I see a hornet/wasp/roach than I will if I see a spider, because they can’t fly and they aren’t huge and shiny and disgusting like roaches…but I have only ever encountered tiny harmless “house spiders.”

Ok, I’ve seen a few random huge weird-looking ones, but even then I didn’t totally panic because they don’t chase you. Spiders are not crazy like roaches and they don’t fly around looking for targets like hornets…

Having said that, I don’t have the OP’s stoicism about spider-killing and tapping and making noise and warning them I’m coming…if I had to live somewhere where that was “common sense” my brain would fry and I’d become a paranoid shut-in who lives in a completely empty house.

Which is why my hat is off the OP. Good God. I’d be moving to Alaska.

[Captain_Amazing]

You didn’t see a Brown Recluse. Brown Recluses don’t live in California. Unless you live in the southern Midwest. the Ozarks, or the Gulf Coast, you’re not going to see any Brown Recluses.

In fact, here’s a rant from a professor at the University of California Riverside about the myth of the Brown Recluse and how Californians are hysterical about seeing Brown Recluses where they aren’t.

Myth of the Brown Recluse Fact, Fear, and Loathing

[shantih]

Can someone please tell me why in the name of all that’s holy and right I open threads with ‘SPIDER’ in the title?
<whimpers piteously>

[Jackmannii]

The OP’s “black widows” may not have been black widows either.

Spiders in the genus Steatoda are often mistaken for black widows.

Interestingly, some have bites which are not all that pleasant, and the symptoms are medically referred to as steatodism, which sounds a lot like Stoidism, which can be unpleasant as well.

[Moirai]

We have lots of black widows in SoCal, but as stated upthread, absolutely no brown recluse spiders. At all. Nice rant, though.

[Southern_Yankee]

Just watch the dark corners on the ceiling above your bed…

[Stoid]

@Jackmannii

The OP’s “black widows” may not have been black widows either.

Spiders in the genus Steatoda are often mistaken for black widows.

Interestingly, some have bites which are not all that pleasant, and the symptoms are medically referred to as steatodism, which sounds a lot like Stoidism, which can be unpleasant as well.

I’ve heard about the “no brown recluse” thing before, and I pray it’s true but I am as sure about the widows as I am about my own existence. The San Fernando Valley is bursting with them, and if I were to make the slightest effort I could and would see several every day. The "false widow’ might fool someone who hasn’t seen a whole lot of widows, but not me. Mine are the real deal.

And in poking around looking at links, assuming the brownie wasn’t a recluse (I’ve heard before this that we don’t have them…and that we do.) I think it might have been a boy widow! Check this out.

[Stoid]

@Captain_Amazing

You didn’t see a Brown Recluse. Brown Recluses don’t live in California. Unless you live in the southern Midwest. the Ozarks, or the Gulf Coast, you’re not going to see any Brown Recluses.

In fact, here’s a rant from a professor at the University of California Riverside about the myth of the Brown Recluse and how Californians are hysterical about seeing Brown Recluses where they aren’t.

Myth of the Brown Recluse Fact, Fear, and Loathing | Spider Research

And AFTER my last post about the boy widow I read this link and I quote:

However, the western black widow looks very different as an immature because it starts out life bedecked in tan and white stripes. As spiderlings mature, more black pigmentation is deposited in the integument with each molt until they turn completely black. Males retain the coloration of the juvenile striped pattern and are often turned into our department because folks are afraid that they are brown recluses.

So it seems I just have LOTS of widows of both sexes…

[Elza_B]

I feel your pain.

Well, not about the poisonous spider, but I happened to be innocently using the restroom today (at home), and had something that looked remarkably similar to this motherfucker crawl OUT OF MY FUCKING JEANS WHICH I WAS WEARING. :eek: It jumped onto the floor, and I proceeded to order the cat to kill it, which didn’t work (fucking duh), and then grabbed a book and beat the shit out of it.

Spiders are scary pieces of shit. Fuck this whole “I’ll put it outside” shit, if they are in MY living space, I will find a book and beat them to death.

I’m still pissed at the cat for ignoring a direct order.

[Johnny_L.A]

@Jackmannii

The OP’s “black widows” may not have been black widows either.

Spiders in the genus Steatoda are often mistaken for black widows.

As a native Southern Californian, who has lived in the desert Northern L.A. County desert not that far from the San Fernando Valley, I believe one is more likely to come across the ol’ Latrodectus than Steatoda. I’ve seen uncounted black widows down there. I never saw a ‘false black widow’ until I moved up here to Western Washington. (I’ll bet I have a few under the couch I’m reclining on right now.)

[Johnny_L.A]

@Elza_B

something that looked remarkably similar to this motherfucker crawl OUT OF MY FUCKING JEANS WHICH I WAS WEARING. :eek:

I was getting ready to go SCUBA diving, and I was hosing out a diving bootie that had been stored in the garage (in the desert). A black widow spider crawled out of it and onto my hand. She was quickly shaken off, and died when I stepped on her.

I think it was last year, or maybe two years ago, that a large (about 5 cm) house spider crawled across my bare foot while I was brushing my teeth. I went and got a jar, caught it, and let it out in the yard.

[elucidator]

Sure as shootin’, some damn Aussie’s gonna come in here and tell us about how they got spiders in Australia that will not only kill you, but eat you. Spiders that will chase you down, kill you and eat you. (One hundred meters/10.4 sec. for the Melbourne Swift Death Spider).

Hell of it is, they’re telling the truth.

[Idlewild]

Well, Dad used to tell us about growing up in Sydney, how they’d play with the trapdoor spiders… poking their wee trapdoors with sticks to annoy the spiders. But those aren’t particularly venomous.

…There was something about redbacks under the seats of the outdoor dunnies, but that was just a traditional way to terrorize children into holding it overnight. Or something. Our relatives in Sydney still had outdoor plumbing, and I hated going in the middle of the night when we visited them. No-one wants a redback bite on the bum.

[Johnny_L.A]

@Idlewild

There was something about redbacks under the seats of the outdoor dunnies, but that was just a traditional way to terrorize children into holding it overnight. Or something. Our relatives in Sydney still had outdoor plumbing, and I hated going in the middle of the night when we visited them. No-one wants a redback bite on the bum.

My dad said the drill was to roll up a newspaper, light it on fire, whisk around the seat, and drop it into the hole.

[Idlewild]

@Johnny_L.A

My dad said the drill was to roll up a newspaper, light it on fire, whisk around the seat, and drop it into the hole.

grumble No one ever offered that suggestion - although possibly the concept of giving a child a newspaper to light wasn’t much safer than the possible spiders.

I LOVE indoor plumbing.

[Bites_When_Provoked]

@Idlewild

…There was something about redbacks under the seats of the outdoor dunnies, but that was just a traditional way to terrorize children into holding it overnight. Or something. Our relatives in Sydney still had outdoor plumbing, and I hated going in the middle of the night when we visited them. No-one wants a redback bite on the bum.

My mother and aunt spent their early youth somewhere out in very rural NSW, where they had an outback dunny.

My aunt says she doesn’t remember spiders so much, but she did once encounter a snake across the doorway :eek:, and is still emotionally scarred from sitting on…

… a frog on the toilet seat.

[Savannah]

I was going to brag about our really big brown spiders here, the ones I see in the autumn, the ones that hang in their webs, bloated and evil. I was going to brag about having wolf spiders. (Come on, wolf spiders? You know with a name like that, they are terrifying.)

We had a wolf spider in the bed once. My husband drew back the covers to get into bed for the night, and screamed. Screamed like a little girl.

But I got nothin’ on Australia’s huntsman spiders.

I am never going to Australia. Ever.