Friday Photo: 31 August
August 31st, 2012 at 7:25 am by ChthoniidSticking with the arachnid theme, here’s a nice profile shot of one of our more endearing native jumping spiders Trite planiceps.
The distinctive traits of these spiders are their very large eyes (they’re primarily a visual hunter) and their powerful front legs with spikes.
Click for larger, higher res image
August 31st, 2012 at 7:33 am
Big eyes and long legs – a deadly combination.
Vote:August 31st, 2012 at 7:35 am
Oh, shit. The bloody things jump?
Vote:August 31st, 2012 at 7:55 am
I watched a Lord Robert Winston doco on ‘Human Instinct’ recently. He wires himself to an anxiety meter and then has a perfectly unharmful – but *absolutely* *enormous* – spider walk along a rail, over his bare hand and back to the rail. The meter climbed and went off the scale and then returned to normal. Apparently we’re hardwired to fear these critters.
Vote:August 31st, 2012 at 9:24 am
These guys (and leaf spiders) are the only things with 8 legs that don’t get my revulsion meter kicking into overdrive.
Little dark coloured spiders can eff right off.
Great big hairy spiders can eff right off.
Even those giant black long-legged Harvestman things can eff right off.
But these guys are cute. They roam around our ceilings picking off the moths (and the fruit flies in summer.) They always seem to rest and wait in plain view, in the middle of a wall or ceiling so they don’t startle me. And they don’t leave cobwebs. They’re just good little flatmates.
Vote:August 31st, 2012 at 9:30 am
I concur, if you wave you finger at them slowly, they follow your movement, too. They are cool.
Vote:August 31st, 2012 at 9:51 am
This is why I avoid the great outdoors
I can’t stand spiders they are the only thing that truely terrifies me!
I find this frustrating but it stems from when I was 4 and I woke up with a spider that was 25cm across on my face; needless to say I was reasonably terrified. Now whenever I see a spider no matter how small all I can see in my mind is the big one!
Vote:August 31st, 2012 at 9:52 am
Can you believe that this the back of a real spider? what a curious- and beautiful- little thing this is. A Ravine Trap Door Spider
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=508636479151214&set=a.182047575143441.48995.171693992845466&type=1&theater
Vote:August 31st, 2012 at 4:06 pm
I dont mind spiders, there are far worse things around, many of them two legged rather than eight. I used to keep all sorts of spiders as pets in my first house, let them build webs wherever they liked, named them after various members of the Royal family…
I used to work in Avondale, in the phone exchange there, and because it was always warm, there were LOTS of Avondale spiders. It wasnt unusual to have them come out of the equipment racks when I pulled something out for servicing. Pulled a bit of equipment out of a rack one morning and swarms came out, one really huge one ran up my arm across my face and into my mouth. I’d have chomped down but I’d already had morning tea
Regards
Vote:Peter J
see http://www.sensiblesentencing.org.nz
August 31st, 2012 at 5:26 pm
Hmm, can’t say I have ever noticed that I have an atavistic fear of spiders. This may account for my habit of heading into the bush at night to photograph many of our nocturnal arachnids. I’ll assume that becauae I don’t bump into anyone else out there, that this is a minority hobby.
The jumping spiders (yeah, they’re actually very adept at it) usually don’t provoke the same level of arachnophobia as the tunnelwebs and the like. I think its more to do with the classic, large-legged, hairy heavy critters that provoke anxiety.
Vote:August 31st, 2012 at 5:34 pm
chthoniid, to be fair.. you and your camera jump in with crocs and sharks, so the lack of fear makes you either super or sub human
Vote: