I used to pick up spiders .........

[Davidc]

to throw them out of the house.

Not any more!

 

[Davidc]

[QUOTE 2728608, member: 45"]There's been a lot of hysteria in the press about these spiders recently when the truth is that they've been around for a while and the bite is less painful than a bee sting and isn't normally a problem at all unless you have an allergic reaction.[/quote]
You may be right - but I don't pick up bees either. I've always thought of spiders as benign in the past.

 

[Peteaud]

Leaving for work the other morning (in the pitch black) I went into the garage via the side door. When I moved the car out I noticed that a massive spider was sitting on my chest. I screamed like a girl then proceeded to break dance with the thing until it sproinged off onto the passenger seat. It sat there, stunned but giving me an evil look, luckily I beat the thing to death with my drink bottle.

I really don't like spiders, and now we have mutant zombie black widow ninja ones after us.

 

[trampyjoe]

Doc George McGavin summed it up perfectly the other day on the Jeremy Vine show when he said 'we should all have a nice big cup of calm the hell down'.

They've been here over a 100 years (the spiders) they're just having a good year. As someone said above, no worse than a bee sting (with the associate allergic reactions). There is no proof that the many bites in the press are actually from False Widows (Steatoda nobilis to give its scientific name) and could be from many other household insects.

Incidently, I've noticed that the reported size of the spiders has varied from 'the size of a 20p coin' right up to 'the size of a 50p coin'. The press should make up their minds! The ones I've seen were only about the size of a 20p coin.

To sum up - 'meh'

 

[laurence]

get a grip. how many people die from spider bites each year a whopping 0.

dog bites - a lot more
car accidents - a hell of a lot more.

i don't like spiders, but this is just idiotic scaremongering and hysteria.

 

[Maz]

I've always thought of spiders as benign in the past.

There all benign in the past, mate. It's the living ones in the present you need to be scared of!

 

[Crackle]

I think I was bitten by a false widow this summer. Unfortunately I squashed it, probably why it bit me but it looked, from what I remember, very like those pictured and the sting was akin to a wasp but lasted longer. Might not have been of course.

 

[Shut Up Legs]

The trouble with being bitten by a false widow is that you can never tell when her not-so-dead husband will turn up.

 

[vernon]

The trouble with being bitten by a false widow is that you can never tell when her not-so-dead husband will turn up.

The male spider partner, like his human equivalent lacks bite.

 

[Crackle]

[QUOTE 2728925, member: 45"]Should have gone to Specsavers.[/quote]
Me or the spider?

 

[Deleted member 1258]

After all the hysteria in the papers I'm taking a closer look at what I'm evicting from the house, or anywhere else, I don't mind spiders, their webs look great covered in ice in the winter, and will just leave them alone most of the time, but my good lady doesn't like them so I'll evict them from the house.

 

[I like Skol]

I was busy tapping away on the forum late one night when my attention was caught by the pitter patter of eight tiny (or not so tiny!) feet scurrying across the living room carpet. As I looked up to confront the intruder he stopped dead and looked me straight in the eye. I quickly grabbed one of the empty Skol cans that lay scattered around me and rolled it towards him. It bounced over the spider harmlessly, he just shook his head then turned to continue his journey. I moved from being sat on the floor to being stretched out on the sofa

 

[totallyfixed]

We have a particular large spider in the house that we call Spencer, in fact Spencer has been with us for about 8 years now. In our first house he ate the mice so that was useful, in the second house he killed next doors cat, so not so useful, in our present home we have no mice and as the lady next door has two cats I keep Spencer happy by feeding him chicken carcasses and road kill.
To think that folks are scared of something the size of a 50p, pah! When I were a lad I used to sleep at bottom of our garden...................

 

[biggs682]

are these the same as grab a granny nights ?

 

[Davidc]

Was ordered to evict one from the bedroom last night - just picked it up and threw it out of the window as usual - BUT I did first look more carefully to make sure it wasn't one of the offending species!