Damn ceiling spiders....

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Seriously just had another one in my hair.....I swear they nest in my ceiling and like to just climb down their web to chill in my hair apparently. I don't even know what kind this one was because I flipped it out of my hair and it ran away before I could see it. I thought I felt something for a while, but figured it was just a wayward hair...but nope, spider.

Probably thought you were food (they hang around on a single thread and drop on prey). You were apparently too big for it.

I caught this fella the other day (about the size of my palm, or a smallish woman's hand; not dangerous, though the fangs could get through your skin easily enough):

Yeah, sounds like not dangerous....o..m..g..

Well, I tend to consider dangerous to be, "if bitten, you're probably going to die or suffer serious illness without anti-venom".

I'm actually arachnophobic, so I go out of my way to catch 'em (I release them outside); it's good therapy. They get bigger than that one. About the size of my hand extended (instead of palm sized for this one). Hard to get those in a cup, but you can do it.

You can herd them outside easily enough with a long object, but that defeats the purpose for me (up close to fight the fear).

What ya need, is one of these:
https://www.google.com/search?q=images+ ... HgodctsJ6Q

Hard to tell from the angle but to me it looks kind of like a Huntsy.

The guy in this picture is trying to catch a giant spider.

https://youtu.be/bRV4d9LCawU

I've caught bigger ones (that one is only hand sized).

He made the mistake of not herding it to a vertical wall. Anyway, it's not going do to anything serious if it falls on you; the bite is relatively innocuous.

(I'll take a photo of the next big one I catch.)

Yep.

It was whitish on top with the black socks on its legs.

I see lots of varying colors.

@Dillogic: She's either a holga carolinensis wolf spider or one of the lesser tarantulae (not sure about gender) if the abdomen's short.

I'm actually obsessed... Araneous Gemmomides orb weavers are my favorite lately.

I've got another pic, but it's front on (I'll put it up anyway). Pretty much looked like a typical Huntsmen (giant crab spider) to me.

I caught a wolf spider a couple of months back (a big one too; it was quite grumpy in the cup), and it looked different (thicker bodied and shorter limbs).

About the size of a largish man's palm:

Well, it could be worse, you could suddenly have one of THESE on you:



It's worth noting that they move *really* fast; there's no point trying to catch one. I've tried. All it led to was me swearing alot. Wasnt even gonna kill it or anything, I just wanted to put it outside...

Still, that means they could just be ON YOU in a couple of quick seconds. I dont get scared or bothered by insects myself, but I can imagine lots of people having a total panic attack if they looked down and one of those things is on them.

I never did figure out how the gigantic things even got into the house; I just know they're often there.

Harmless things though; most of the time they keep to themselves, and will also obliterate the usual pests that people hate the most such as ants and termites, without doing any damage themselves.

Oh yeah, arachnids are definitely our friends. I even have scorpions around my place ( not in the house, thankfully) and I just take a live and let live attitude towards them.

I'm not too benevolent to all spiders:

I'll kill Redbacks when I see 'em (100% of the time if they're in the house; they're actually fast, so you have to be quick). Haven't seen a Funnel Web, but I'd kill one all the same (unless of course, it's nowhere near the house).

Some critters just aren't worth it.

You need to get out of that basement, spiders or any type of bug in my hair would probably give me a heart attack.

When I go a week sans bugs in hair, I (often correctly) assume I've spent too much time at my desk... My arachnaphoba long since gave way to my entomolology hobby, I love spiders, THEY EAT TICKS. I have limited knowledge of millipedes but I know some can be venomous so be careful, Misery, until you've ID'd those.

@Dill: Woah, the huntsmen subspecies I've seen topped out around 2cm. I'd love to meet yours... I took a few pics yesterday of WA's orb weaver denizens and digital zoom + autofocus makes it pretty tricky.