Creature Feature: Spitting Spider.

There seem to be a lot of misconceptions about spiders. For instance, most spiders are not dangerous, and are not malicious arachnids aiming to wipe out humanity. Another, less-crippling misconception is that spiders spit their silk. No- it comes out the other end.

There are, however, a few exceptions to this rule. There is a group of spiders called spitting spiders.  The family of spitting spiders, Scytodes, do just that: spit silk. Oh, and the silk's coated in venom, too. Screw webs - this spider manages to snag prey and envenomate it all at once. The family is found worldwide. At least Spider-Man only shot gunk.

Spitting spiders have silk glands at their head. These are right next to the venom glands, thus allowing for poisonous string. The silk then shoots out of the fangs and onto whatever the spider sees as dinner. Suddenly, Twilight's venom fangs don't seem so implausible.

These spiders are also evil masterminds at what they do. They plot out the trajectory of their spit. Then, like the world's sickest icing, they drizzle the venomous filament over their target by zig-zagging. This lets the spider take down prey much larger than itself, including other spiders!



(Another one caught a brown recluse- one of the few spiders I'll kill on sight. Praise it. PRAAAAIIISE IIIIT!)

Spitting spiders are also surprisingly social. Families will dine on one corpse, live in the same web (which is not used to catch flies), and overall have a fun time together. Some even look after their little spiderlings. On the flipside, however, these spiders are also cannibalistic.

Creature Feature: Myrmarachnids.

Not many people like spiders. The awesome lady with the spider jewelry last night was more an exception to the rule than anything. They are, however, fascinating creatures that really deserve more entries on this blog.

Look out, here comes the Spider-Ant! Actually, it's an ant-mimicking jumping spider (Myrmarachne formicaria), but close enough. It's native to Africa, with relatives in many places.

In all seriousness, though, there are a number of jumping spiders who have ants as alter-egos. They span at least two genera, and are native to most tropical parts of the world. A few live in temperate regions. Yes, they eat insects, like most other spiders. Despite awesome mimicry, this is not cannibalism. There are an amazing amount of these spiders. Cue mass-entry guilt.

For those of you who know nothing about arthropod anatomy, here's a little primer. Insects have three body segments and six legs. Spiders have two body segments and eight legs, plus two pedipalps. A number of tricks are used to pull off that visual trickery, including raising the forelegs like antennae and making the pedipalps look eerily close to an ant's head. It's a darn good job.

Why the spiders do this is something of a mystery. Always suspecting the worst of a venomous creature, scientists first thought that spider-ants were infiltrating anthills by going in undercover. This turned out not to be the case for many, but not all, ant-mimics. Unbeknownst to most humans, ants taste bad, and can also sting with formic acid. Not a bad thing to disguise oneself as.

Of course, this won't protect them from humans who hate ants, too...and there are quite a lot of those. You fooled nobody with A Bug's Life, Disney - ants are crafty little buggers who wind up in my bathroom every spring. Yeah, disguising yourself as an ant won't work well all the time.

Bio-Art: Insect jewelry?!

Among the things one can get at ReptileFest, a few trinkets will always be related to insects and other arthropods. There was the framed cicada I showed you yesterday, but also jewelry with scorpions,  beetles, and other such things imprisoned in lucite for better viewing.

Yes, you read that right: Jewelry with real dead scorpions in it.

Auctions relist often.

This is an especially stunning scorpion pendant from eBay seller china_custom_5000. People can get very creative with sticking insects into clear plastic. This one almost looks like it's trapped in amber, and that setting is just to die for.  Of course, given that the Chinese sellers of such things love advertising that they're from Tibet, I'd think twice. Still a very nice piece of jewelry. I also like the ones that glow in the dark. 

Scorpions not your thing? How about beetle bracelets, then? The seller there is where I got my own rose chafer bracelet from; now I wish I'd gotten the chafer bracelet linked above! (Glow in the dark things make Kuro very happy). A lot of their things seem like Chinese repacks (you'll notice a lot of bug jewelry sellers located in China/Hong Kong), but they're cheaper, ship from the U.S., and have tons of cool packaging. Check 'em out at www.realcoolbug.com if you're not into eBay. They do good work!

Now for one of my personal insectoid covet items on eBay: a glow-in-the-dark cicada computer mouse. There's also a clear one, but again, the glowy one is fine for sampling. A lot of these things come in multiple colors, so if you have an outfit that a scorpion would look great on, by all means get one that matches. Hell, my chafer bracelet has alligator pleather on it; this stuff can work.

Along with being eaten, making insects into accessories seems to be the new 'in' thing. There also used to be green rose chafer clocks, but I can't find them anymore. If you want to invest in these, the sellers in China adore wholesalers, and will gladly sell you dozens for roughly 40 bucks. Have fun!

Creature Feature:...Gold Skulltula?

Confession: I am taking my sweet, sweet time with Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time for the 3DS. Almost to the end of the Shadow Temple, which is...I want to say the second to last. Then there will be mini-quests to do, simply because the game is set in a world almost as awesome as ours.

Just as a reminder, here's a real, live Gold Skulltula:



Kidding. The Gold Skulltulas in Zelda were clearly based off of Argiope savignyi. They can be found from Mexico to Bolivia. They are not necessarily gold; the golden female above was one of several color variations.  For those curious about the generic name, "Savigny" happened to be the last name of Marie Jules Cesar Savigny, the first person to describe the genus Argiope. He was a guy, by the way.

For those of you who do not know spiders, they can be classified in terms of how they weave their webs. Argiope spiders are particularly creative orb-weavers. A. savignyi can weave a number of patterns into its orb web. Among them are a cross-shape and disc-shape. Sometimes, these designs are combined into a super-pattern. The resulting web, regardless of pattern, is very sturdy...which results in one of the few things this spider is known for:



Yes, that is a bat in that spiderweb. Yes, the spider is being a vampire and slowly sucking out its inner juices. Gold Skulltul- I mean A. savignyi is one of the few invertebrate predators of bats. Specifically, they feed on the proboscis bat (Rhynchonycteris naso) - a strange critter in and of itself. These aren't even unhealthy bats - just unlucky bats who don't see the Argiope's web. They are successfully entangled within two hours. Again, pick your favorite; some wouldn't be rooting for the spider or the bat in this instance.

As a friendly reminder: Wild A. savignyi do not grant you magical items every time you kill ten of them. Do not carry a hookshot around in preparation. If you happen to think you have a hookshot at your belt, by the way, please see a therapist or look for "Zelda Addicts Anonymous."

Creature Feature: Goliath Birdeater.

We at the blog should be scaring you all silly during the month of October. Then again, we should be trying to do that all the time, making this month not very special at all. That means we have to try extra hard for the rest of the month, so expect every spell ingredient in the book to get its own blog page.

Yesterday was a newt. Today...



...is a MASSIVE spider.

The Goliath birdeater (Theraposa blondi) is the second largest spider in the world. It has a legspan of up to a foot. It is native to the Amazon rainforest, which is a good place to avoid if you are easily intimidated. There are enough deadly animals there to fill a whole week's worth of entries. This spider is not among them.

The Goliath birdeater does not eat birds at every meal. Most of its diet consists of invertebrates. The name comes from a Victorian report of this spider eating a hummingbird - in other words, small bird, big spider. Due to its size, Goliath can consume a number of vertebrates, including birds, lizards, bats, and venomous snakes. Depending on your specific set of phobias, a spider that eats snakes may be more or less terrifying than one that does not.



Luckily, this super-spider is not harmful to humans. Its bite is only as bad as a wasp sting. Worry more about the hairs it sheds in defense; those will irritate your skin. Again, this is not nearly as badas one would expect from such a large spider.

Arachnophobes, you got off easy. We've already covered most of the nasty Australian stuff for you.

Creature Feature: Brown Recluse Spider.

After reading all of my blog posts, you are probably thinking that there is no creature that I will not obsessively love for a day. Just like everyone else, however, I have one creature that I simply do not like. That creature is the brown recluse spider (Loxosceles reclusa).



No, I am not an arachnophobe. I have nothing against spiders. My usual instinct is to take whatever spider I find and move it out of harm's way. I just do not like this particular spider, even though it lives in my neighborhood.

Brown recluse spiders are native to the midwestern U.S. down to the Gulf of Mexico. It is identified primarily by the fiddle-shaped mark on its back. It is also a fairly large spider, so it is easy to see this little deathbringer coming. Their favorite hiding places are in the basements and drawers of suburban households.

So, why don't I like it? Put simply, this:

One bite from a brown recluse causes necrosis. Some people feel nothing at first, but the area will become inflamed within a few hours. The pain slowly gets worse until the flesh and other soft tissues are rotted through. If that was not bad enough, the wound is also open to infection. Ouch.

Of course, it's the human's fault if the spider bites. The name says it all: These are shy spiders. Humans just made several perfect environments for these spiders to live in. Many spider bites are also misdiagnosed; Staphylococcus aureus can cause similar symptoms if it infects the bite. As a reminder, those are the same bacteria that have become resistant to antibiotics. Even if the spider is not initially responsible for necrosis, its bite is nasty.


It's even sadder when a llama gets bitten.

The recluse's bite is just about the only cool thing about it. There are no markings or similar that say, "hey, I'm a dangerous spider that may melt your skin off." I am not about to systematically eradicate these guys, but if one crosses my path, expect it to be hit with a newspaper.

Tomorrow: Oh SHIT that fish attacked my naughty bits!