[HN Gopher] Joro spiders likely to spread beyond Georgia
___________________________________________________________________
Joro spiders likely to spread beyond Georgia
Author : perihelions
Score : 172 points
Date : 2022-03-09 19:35 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (news.uga.edu)
(TXT) w3m dump (news.uga.edu)
| wolverine876 wrote:
| > This is the first article by Axios Richmond's Karri Peifer
|
| Looking at the headline and the comparison to bubonic plague
| (which apparently spread via shipping containers several
| centuries ago), I wonder if it's just a first article or Axios's
| future direction.
| freetime2 wrote:
| The link has since been updated to the more informative and
| less sensational University of Georgia article.
|
| For those wondering what this comment is referencing, here is
| the original article: https://www.axios.com/local/washington-
| dc/2022/03/09/giant-j...
|
| For what it's worth, I got a chuckle out of the original. I can
| definitely appreciate the sentiment, as I have unknowingly
| walked into a quite few Joro spider webs and it never fails to
| creep me out.
| danShumway wrote:
| I'm of course happy to know they're harmless and (as far as we
| can tell) not horribly dangerous for the ecosystem, but speaking
| as someone who
|
| A) has arachnophobia and a general fear of insects, and
|
| B) lives completely alone and can't get someone else to deal with
| stuff like this for me,
|
| would someone who lives in Georgia be willing to confirm to me
| whether or not they come into houses, and how serious of a game
| plan I need to make for dealing with them?
|
| I deal with house centipedes/crickets[0] with Raid and then
| scooping up the body after they're dead. Setting up bug barriers,
| keeping things clean, and keeping down any other insect
| populations that they'd feed on seems to deal with most
| everything else. Tiny bugs like boxelder bugs show up rarely, and
| are small enough that I can squish them without much trouble, but
| anything bigger than an inch is tough to deal with.
|
| So if I'm likely to find one of these on my wall in my living
| room (even just occasionally), I legitimately need to plan ahead
| and figure out a one-person strategy for killing/moving them out
| of my house in a way that it isn't traumatizing, and if
| conventional bug barriers don't work to keep them out then I need
| to figure out something else for reducing the likelihood of them
| coming in the house.
|
| If they're just outside, that's not so much of a problem, big
| bugs are fine outside, although it'll likely put a bit of a
| damper on my willingness to go hiking in wood trails given
| people's descriptions of the webs.
|
| ----
|
| [0]: Yes, I know house centipedes are positive predators to have
| around and shouldn't be treated as pests, but I need to be able
| to walk into my bathroom without worrying I'll find one on the
| wall.
| pg_bot wrote:
| I live in SC and have seen some of these spiders. None of them
| have come inside our property, they like to build very large
| webs between trees and hangout there.
| GrinningFool wrote:
| You might want to look into 'bug grabbers'. We have one and it
| really does work as advertised. We use it regularly on large
| spiders, stink bugs, and occasional wasps.
| danShumway wrote:
| Maybe silly question, but how do you get the insect back out
| in a controlled way? I assume they don't die inside of there.
|
| I have a vacuum with a detachable wand, but I've never really
| used it for insects because I always felt like... now what?
| Can't they just crawl back out?
|
| Also slightly skeptical of a handheld grabber or my vacuum's
| ability to handle a 3 inch spider, but maybe I'm
| overestimating their grabbing strength. I guess I could also
| upgrade.
| [deleted]
| doctoring wrote:
| I was visiting family in NE Atlanta last fall. These spiders
| were everywhere -- coating houses, trees, power lines. And yet,
| they do not seem to come into homes. Even the exterminators
| they called said so.
| danShumway wrote:
| Assuming you're correct, hearing this genuinely makes me feel
| way better.
|
| It's not even necessarily a complete avoidance thing --
| seeing a large insect when I'm outside just feels different;
| it's something I'm more prepped for, I'm in a different
| mental state. Huge boon if I'll mostly only need to worry
| about them when biking/walking.
| mkr-hn wrote:
| No Joro spiders inside so far. At least 50 _around_ the house,
| going by webs, but none inside. They kept their distance
| outside.
| throwanem wrote:
| Orb weavers rarely enter human dwellings, although they do
| quite like porches for the combination of good web substrate
| and the prey-attracting effect of porch lights and lit windows.
|
| I've only had an orb weaver in the house a couple of times, and
| once ushered back out they typically remain so. One of them, a
| young red orb weaver, abseiled down from the ceiling onto my
| bare shoulder - I'm not sure which of us was more surprised,
| but even if I didn't like spiders quite well in general, I
| think her evident terror upon realizing her mistake would have
| aroused some degree of sympathy.
|
| Most spiders you'll encounter indoors in the eastern US will be
| cobweb spiders, of which family black widows are by far the
| most famous - but also very rare, with more typically
| encountered cobweb spiders being quite harmless to humans. (Of
| course, so are widows, when given proper respect, as with the
| one who overwintered behind the toilet tank one year when I was
| ten or so. She kept to herself and so did we, and we all got
| along fine - and they are such beautiful creatures!) Beyond
| that you can expect the occasional wolf spider, salticid, or
| the like, these being cursorial hunters and thus not so much
| homebodies as spiders generally tend to be.
| blakesterz wrote:
| "They likely traveled across the globe on shipping containers,
| similar to the Bubonic plague."
|
| Seems like an odd choice to compare a spider and the Bubonic
| plague. Wouldn't any number of invasive species have been better?
| throwanem wrote:
| "Invasive" is mostly a matter of perspective.
|
| By far the most successful invasive arthropod in the Nearctic
| is the European honeybee, but you never really hear anyone talk
| about the considerable ecological harm those do, for the
| obvious reason that their agricultural and thus economic
| utility is considered far to outweigh the externalities of
| their cultivation.
| smhenderson wrote:
| The whole article is a bit tongue-in-cheek, with it's
| references to "terrifying" even though it also says they're
| harmless. And the end, where he says to build a dome over GA
| now before it's too late, etc. I laughed out loud a little at
| that last bit.
|
| So I think the plague reference was meant as another way to
| exaggerate the severity of the situation for humorous effect.
| That was my take anyway.
| Johnny555 wrote:
| _The whole article is a bit tongue-in-cheek, with it 's
| references to "terrifying" even though it also says they're
| harmless_
|
| A spider the size of the palm of your hand sounds pretty
| terrifying to me no matter how harmless it is, but then I
| really don't like spiders of any size.
| chairmanwow1 wrote:
| I thought it said the size of a child's hand.
| quantum_magpie wrote:
| Having come across them in Japan many times, they can get
| as big as 10 cm across. Slightly less than a hand, but
| still _extremely_ distressing when you run face-first
| into one.
| jrumbut wrote:
| Why do I keep reading the comments on this story?
|
| I'm booking a one way trip to the North Pole or wherever
| these flying spiders aren't.
| exhilaration wrote:
| Sorry bud: _Spiders make up a significant portion of the
| animal population in the Arctic._ -
| https://animals.mom.com/spiders-arctic-6713.html
|
| Looks like we're both signing up for the first one-way
| trip to Mars.
| brailsafe wrote:
| Ah, but they're just cute little things.
| sundarurfriend wrote:
| Hilarious that someone went to the trouble of downvoting
| you for this (comment is gray as I type this). Someone
| _really_ doesn 't like spiders.
| sundvor wrote:
| The Huntsman spider in Australia is similarly harmless
| one might believe - a useful pest controller as well.
|
| Until one crawls across the windshield of your car whilst
| driving.
|
| I'm glad I was the driver when it happened. I can still
| remember the screams of my then co-pilot, however. She
| definitely had arachnophobia.
| tejohnso wrote:
| They're trying to make it sound terrifying in a fun way (I
| think, maybe sarcastic). It's under a heading of "Other
| terrifying things to know about the Joro spider" along with a
| bunch of other facts that are not at all terrifying.
| bombcar wrote:
| I'm more interested in the 14th century shipping containers.
| Wohlf wrote:
| Differently shaped wooden crates and barrels, mostly.
| mkr-hn wrote:
| Some attempts to explore this on the worldbuilding Stack
| Exchange: https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/1
| 28160/wha...
| Miner49er wrote:
| Man, these things are annoying. I think I live in an area where
| they really started taking off, because I've seen them the last
| two or three summers. It seems like they are more and more every
| year. They make huge webs (like up to 6 ft huge, with single webs
| going out even further) right at or above eye level and then just
| sit in the middle of them. When hiking or biking trails you have
| to constantly keep an eye out for them or you'll constantly be
| walking into them.
|
| Edit: There's a pretty good example picture of the webs in the
| UGA article mentioned by the main article:
| https://news.uga.edu/joro-spiders-likely-to-spread-beyond-ge...
| jdmichal wrote:
| Sounds reminiscent of banana spiders here in Florida -- aka
| golden orb weaver or golden silk spider. They do the same thing
| with their webs, which can also be hard to see due to the
| coloring. (The "golden" is due to the silk's yellow color, not
| the spider's.)
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trichonephila_clavipes
|
| https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/in467
| wil421 wrote:
| Yes we have those in Georgia too. I used to see them a lot
| but I think the Joro might be taking over their habitat.
| nkozyra wrote:
| Yeah these guys (well gals) can get pretty huge.
|
| My least favorite Florida spider is also nonvenomous but I
| used to get bitten by the spiny orb weaver any time I was
| near a citrus tree.
| jdmichal wrote:
| Huh. I have those around and didn't even know they bit. Had
| one living in my screened patio a week or so ago, but I
| think it finally figured out that it wasn't going to catch
| much there...
| nkozyra wrote:
| Like most spiders they tend to avoid humans. But if your
| chore growing up is to clean up all the rotting oranges
| you're going to be in their territory a bit and the bites
| are really uncomfortable.
|
| The worst part was the pain would last a few hours.
| kahrl wrote:
| Found an article that compares the two!
| https://news.uga.edu/joro-spiders-likely-to-spread-beyond-
| ge...
|
| "The study found that despite their similarities, the Joro
| spider has about double the metabolism of its relative, has a
| 77% higher heart rate and can survive a brief freeze that
| kills off many of its cousins. These findings mean the Joro
| spider's body functions better than its relative in a cold
| environment.
|
| And that means the Joros can likely exist beyond the borders
| of the Southeast."
| ohwellhere wrote:
| I went trail running in Georgia several years ago and came
| within a few inches of running into one on its web that blocked
| the whole trail.
|
| I know now from the article that they're harmless, but as a
| mild arachnophobe the experience was highly unpleasant.
| laurent92 wrote:
| I pruned trees in Kununurra, Northern Australia, and there
| was a spider in each tree we'd cut (500/day). Harmless or
| not, they tend to climb once they're on you, so those of us
| who are afraid of spiders would just let them climb and shook
| our hats while proceeding to the next tree. Yes, climb across
| the face. The leader didn't bother, so spiders would fight on
| his hat.
|
| Awesome experience, but a few people harmed during the
| summer, mostly because of the tools (and one by bees, one by
| green caterpillars, one by dehydration after going to work by
| 40degC after a night drinking - so basically all their faults
| as long as you value yourself). Said boss had prison
| experience. I tend to believe Gen Y misses the year of
| military service and tend to replace it with similar
| experiences, and the gap year in Australia is toughening for
| the office monkey and the nerds we were. 100% would do it
| again.
| [deleted]
| deebosong wrote:
| I would watch this as an anime. Both from the POV of the
| humans, but first and foremost from SPIDERVISION.
| throwanem wrote:
| You'd be disappointed. Orb weavers see quite poorly, and
| rely on their webs as their primary sensory modality for
| perceiving their surroundings. This is why they spend so
| little time off the web, and also why male spiders pursue
| such slow and painstaking courtships, plucking the web
| with enormous care to ensure their prospective partner
| recognizes their approach rather than mistaking them for
| prey.
| na85 wrote:
| Time to start carrying a badminton racquet while jogging.
| standardUser wrote:
| Your description helped me realize these are the spiders I was
| constantly dodging on trails outside of Puerto Vallarta last
| year! The webs were usually over my head on the trails, but I
| imagine that's only because of trail usage.
| jdmichal wrote:
| Those might have been banana spiders / golden orb weavers,
| which are native to the southeast US down to northern South
| America. They have the same web-building habit as described.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trichonephila_clavipes
|
| https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/publication/in467
| throwanem wrote:
| Probably - I've seen an orb weaver learn to spin her web out
| of the way of humans, lest we disarrange her careful work.
| dang wrote:
| We've changed to that link from
| https://www.axios.com/local/washington-dc/2022/03/09/giant-j...
| above. Thanks!
| throwanem wrote:
| Worth mentioning is that it is very young spiderlings, not
| adults, who engage in "ballooning" to disperse from their natal
| web.
|
| You don't need to worry about giant spiders with four-inch
| legspans falling on your head! Or not more than usually, at least
| - the spiders drifting out of the sky will be only at most
| perhaps the size of a matchhead, and even more harmless than they
| would be when full-sized.
| 6510 wrote:
| While we brag about our boats and flying machines they do all
| that.
| ayngg wrote:
| A couple years ago I was in Tokyo and even just going up Takaosan
| I could see the pathway up was surrounded by what looked like
| these guys everywhere, you could look up and see a bunch just
| floating on their webs above the trail. Even on such a well
| traveled path you could just graze the flora on the side and you
| would pick up some web threads.
|
| The thought of just going slightly off the path and basically
| being covered by them made me shudder.
| mkr-hn wrote:
| We've had them for a couple of years. They keep to themselves,
| eat bugs you do not want that their local cousins can't while
| coexisting, and make great photo subjects.
|
| https://twitter.com/givemefoxes/status/1501615636664958976
|
| edit to add: What I did notice is that the insect population
| seems to be returning after years of decline. I see more bugs
| around lights every year. These could be the wolves of creepy
| crawlies.
| jcadam wrote:
| Looks like I moved from the Southeast to Alaska just in time...
| meowzero wrote:
| I live in an area with Joros. I don't mind spiders at all. But
| these joros are a pest. They take over literally everything. They
| will cover all your porches, trees, etc. with their webs. Their
| webs are massive, multi-layered, and tough.
|
| I don't usually kill spiders or take down their webs, but I kill
| these guys and remove their webs whenever they build near my
| house. It's futile, but I do it anyway.
|
| This article seem to say they're harmless. But I have heard
| reports of them harming local hummingbird population and driving
| local spiders out.
| anotherhue wrote:
| There is no water on Earth for giant insects!
| whalesalad wrote:
| 2022 bingo card: putin invades ukraine, oil tops 130/barrel,
| giant spiders fall from sky.
| ffhhj wrote:
| Recommended movie on those topics: Enemy (2013)
| fistynuts wrote:
| Dogs and cats, living together
| [deleted]
| MaxfordAndSons wrote:
| The big twist is that we end up nuking ourselves to get rid of
| the giant sky spiders.
| MikeDelta wrote:
| You'd expect, according to Hollywood logic, that in the
| aftermath of nuke attacks the arachnids and insects become as
| big as horses.
| throwanem wrote:
| Nah. Not enough oxygen in the atmosphere to support
| terrestrial arthropods much larger than the ones that
| currently live on Earth, or Joro spiders would be much less
| remarkable for their size - there's only so much you can do
| with the relatively simple means of oxygenation that
| arthropods have thus far evolved.
|
| A shame, if you ask me. Social wasps are already quite
| smart despite having only a few hundred thousand neurons
| apiece to work with; I think I'd quite like to live in a
| world where the largest hornets were perhaps dog-sized,
| with brains to match, or indeed much larger still. If
| nothing else, maybe people wouldn't so often look at me
| funny for how well I get on with wasps and spiders, as if
| there were some absurd betrayal of essential humanity in
| the simple act of not being frightened by animals compared
| to even the largest of which we may as well be so many
| walking mountains.
| brailsafe wrote:
| Money becomes worthless, housing market crashes again
| 1_player wrote:
| The stock market goes up and down and sometimes crashes, the
| housing market goes up indefinitely. Nothing can stop it
| apparently.
| jacobsenscott wrote:
| I'll refer you to 2008. I suspect my future self will also
| refer you to 2023, but we shall see!
| throwanem wrote:
| You really think it's going to take that long?
| rapind wrote:
| I wouldn't bet against you on that one.
| buu700 wrote:
| I mean, winning that bet would be kind of a Pyrrhic
| victory.
| Serverless_joe wrote:
| Global pandemic... geopolitical tension... giant spiders
| now?!?!?!
| ModernMech wrote:
| Maybe the murder hornets will save us from the spiders? Or are
| the spiders supposed to save us from the murder hornets?
| throwanem wrote:
| Sparrow hornets and orb weavers aren't too likely to
| interact.
|
| In theory the spider might prey on the hornet, but sparrow
| hornets are large and strong enough that I suspect it would
| take a very busy spider to envenom one, and avoid being stung
| in the process, before the hornet broke free of the web. Too,
| wasps and hornets see much more acutely than many realize,
| and likely have a decent chance of seeing and dodging webs -
| I did once see a bumblebee caught in a red orb weaver's web,
| but never yet a wasp or hornet, for whatever that's worth. (I
| _have_ seen a drunk bald-faced yellowjacket sleeping it off
| on my porch, with an orb weaver web in direct line between
| her and the fig tree, but I don 't know that she didn't get
| there before the spider had spun her web for the night.)
|
| Sparrow hornets also aren't known yet to have made it east of
| the Rockies, and the intervening terrain would be very
| difficult for them at least, more likely impossible. That
| said, they and Joro spiders hail from much the same origin
| and may regularly share territory, in which case their
| relationships are probably fairly well known - I'd likely be
| able to say more here, except that I don't read Japanese and
| thus can't review the relevant literature.
| ketzo wrote:
| No no, the murder hornets and spiders are supposed to
| distract each other so that the bear-sharks can finally rise
| from the depths and conquer the mainland.
| nemacol wrote:
| Murder hornets to the west, giant spiders to the east. Take
| your chances with the tornados in middle America.
| 97s wrote:
| I was one of the first people to report them spreading back
| almost 4(edit) years ago. One day I was taking in groceries and I
| noticed a golden glimmer by my front door between 3 trees I have.
| I took a closer look and I realized it was a massive 6-10 foot
| web, that had 3-4 layers of web spread between the trees. Right
| smack in the center of it was this beautiful 3 inch spider that
| was amazing looking. Right below her was this tiny male spider
| that was barely 1/8 her size. I immediately looked her up and
| spotted an article about how they came to be and to report their
| sightings. I emailed the UGA professor about this and he was
| surprised to see they had already came this far in.
|
| Almost 4(edit) years later, when you go outside on a misty
| morning during the summer, you look up into the trees as you
| drive home and it is literally nothing but glimmering Joro spider
| webs. Thousands of them.
|
| Most of them now appear in my back yard as I removed those trees,
| but it was crazy to see peoples faces when they walked to my
| front door and realized what they were walking past and freaked
| out at a 3 inch spider about 5 foot away from them.
|
| edit: when I looked up the UGA professor name I realized I
| emailed it back in September 2018! Crazy.
| [deleted]
| echelon wrote:
| Unless there are other giant yellow spiders with black legs and
| big webs native to Georgia, I'm almost certain I spotted these
| when jogging by my neighbor's house in North Georgia around
| 2007. It was terrifying looking, and it stuck with me.
|
| It had to be around that time, because I moved shortly
| thereafter.
|
| Anecdotal, but when I saw this headline I immediately thought
| back upon it.
| mkr-hn wrote:
| Those are the local variety. The new ones are much, much
| bigger.
| munificent wrote:
| Probably just a banana spider:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trichonephila_clavipes
|
| Here's one from 2006 in Central Florida: https://www.flickr.c
| om/photos/bobisbob/299200141/in/datepost...
| nik41tkins wrote:
| Not in GA but close enough. My guess is you saw
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argiope_aurantia
| 97s wrote:
| There are some other yellow spiders, but nothing really
| compares to this one. They don't make traditional webs. They
| make massive ugly janky looking webs from all different
| directions that span across a lot of different branches. I
| don't think they came to be until about 3 years ago. The UGA
| professor says that they believe they came from a freight
| truck traveling up I85 as they hatched off.
| oyebenny wrote:
| Who was the professor if I may ask? He may have been mine!
| Etymology is a very niche community at UGA!
| 97s wrote:
| Edward Hoebeke
| p3rls wrote:
| etymology from the greek etumos for "true"
|
| entomology from the greek entomon for "insect", the tom
| actually is the same tom in atom.
| nix23 wrote:
| >They likely traveled across the globe on shipping containers,
| similar to the Bubonic plague.
|
| Ah yes i heard of that, the Bubonic plague traveled in/on?
| shipping containers.
|
| Is that a stupid AI or a stupid Human who writes articles like
| that?
| MisterTea wrote:
| A wooden barrel or crate is a form of container.
| nix23 wrote:
| Who ships fleas in barrels? Probably more like rodent and
| fleas with humans on ships....just forget the
| barrels/containers...senseless point ;)
| cmrdporcupine wrote:
| I want that. In my vineyard here in Ontario. Eating copious
| quantities of Japanese Beetles.
|
| Can they survive -20C?
| seba_dos1 wrote:
| Georgia seemed to me like a weird place to talk about regarding
| big colorful spiders that may spread beyond the country, but it
| turns out that the USA has a state with the same name (TIL).
| davesque wrote:
| Here's their informative, definitely-not-clickbait-fear-mongering
| list of bullet points later down in the article:
|
| "* They are bright yellow, black, blue, and red and can grow _up
| to 3 inches._
|
| * They likely traveled across the globe on shipping containers,
| _similar to the Bubonic plague._
|
| * Their life cycle begins in early spring, _but they get big_ in
| June and are often seen in July and August.
|
| * They're named for Jorogumo, a creature of Japanese folklore
| that can shapeshift into a woman or spider before _killing its
| prey._ "
|
| Emphasis added.
| flanking_pajama wrote:
| I know this article and the comments are pretty light about this,
| but I really do wonder what they eat and what we're eventually
| going to hear about being muscled out of the local ecosystems as
| a result of their success. At least their introduction wasn't
| intentional, which tbh is kind of scary in itself.
|
| Globalism: it's for spiders, too.
| jwozn wrote:
| There is some good news there. From an article posted in a
| different comment: "Joros don't appear to have much of an
| effect on local food webs or ecosystems, said Andy Davis,
| corresponding author of the study and a research scientist in
| the Odum School of Ecology. They may even serve as an
| additional food source for native predators like birds." [0]
|
| [0] https://news.uga.edu/joro-spiders-likely-to-spread-beyond-
| ge...
| spyspy wrote:
| Spotted lanternflies with any luck
| Ericson2314 wrote:
| Yes was thinking the same. Tree of heaven -> lanternflies ->
| these spiders would be a pretty tight fable!
| BirAdam wrote:
| Here in GA, there are already multiple types of orb weaver and
| these are in the same niche with one exception: they will also
| eat stink bugs. There are also many birds who eat the orb
| weavers and will also eat the Joros. They basically slide right
| in without too much serious impact.
| fjert wrote:
| All I could find is that we know they eat brown marmorated
| stink bugs[0].
|
| "Joro spiders also appear to be able to capture and feed on at
| least one insect that other local spiders are not: adult brown
| marmorated stink bugs, an invasive pest that can infest houses
| and damage crops."
|
| [0] https://news.uga.edu/joro-spiders-are-here-to-stay/
| jsnodlin wrote:
| buu700 wrote:
| How much would it cost to import more Joro spiders? I'll be
| writing to my local representatives immediately.
| nneonneo wrote:
| ...and that's how we end up with invasive species problems.
| yissp wrote:
| If they get out of hand, just bring in another species
| that preys on the spiders, problem solved :)
| sundvor wrote:
| Do you need any rabbits? Cheers from Australia
| AutumnCurtain wrote:
| That's the beauty of it. When winter rolls around, the
| gorillas simply freeze to death.
| viraptor wrote:
| Cane toads in Australia:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cane_toads_in_Australia
|
| > In June 1935, 102 cane toads were imported to Gordonvale
| from Hawaii
|
| > Since their release, toads have rapidly multiplied in
| population and now number over 200 million (...) but also
| no evidence indicates that they have affected the cane
| beetles for which they were introduced to prey upon.
| amanzi wrote:
| Not sure why the article describes these as harmless? If one of
| them parachutes down on to my face, I'm sure I'll die of a heart
| attack - hopefully a quick death.
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| I think I read somewhere that they have a tendency to leap onto
| objects passing underneath them that are several thousand times
| their mass and try to spread throughout the land.
| Bellend wrote:
| Oh man, you aren't alone. This is nightmare fuel. I would move
| away from the area guaranteed just to escape the possibility.
| As far as I know, my only fear is spiders and it makes up for
| being blase about almost everything else. I still check my room
| before I get into bed because 2 years ago a House Spider (about
| the size of a pint glass hole) was on the headboard as I was
| minding my own business in bed. Not too long ago I had a
| nightmare about that. Never mind it's parachuting yellow
| brothers from the sky being a thing. No way.
| throwanem wrote:
| Only young juveniles balloon; on the one hand it's how they
| disperse from their natal web, and on the other only a very
| tiny spider is light enough to balloon at all. You probably
| wouldn't even notice if one landed on you.
|
| In any case, they're a lot more scared of us, and fairly so -
| imagine Cthulhu peering into your bedroom window, and you've
| got a fair picture of what it's like to be a spider who's
| suffered the mishap of somehow attracting human attention.
| jrumbut wrote:
| If Cthulu peered into my bedroom I'd ask him to kill the
| spider.
| throwanem wrote:
| Which would avail you nothing, most likely, and this is
| by way of being my point: it may possibly ameliorate your
| fear to try to understand what an interaction between a
| human and a spider might be like from the spider's
| perspective.
| chihuahua wrote:
| I notice this whenever I try to pick up a spider and bring
| it outside the house. They want to jump off my hand as
| quickly as possible, and descend to the ground on a strand
| of silk. They have no interest in biting etc.
|
| So the best way to bring them outside is to put a plastic
| cup over the spider, then carefully slide a postcard
| underneath the cup, and then release it outside.
| throwanem wrote:
| I avoid that because it risks harming the spider - the
| cup/card interface is basically one giant moving pinch
| point, and the force required to cause traumatic
| amputation is insignificant by human standards. But they
| can only secrete silk so quickly, which makes the escape
| thread itself very serviceable as a means of carrying
| them to safety - just raise your hand gradually as they
| extend the thread, so they don't touch down until you
| want them to.
|
| It depends on the spider, too. Orb weavers are reliably
| fearful, which makes sense given how little they can
| perceive away from a web, but I've had the occasional
| salticid climb up to perch on my knuckles with no sign of
| dismay, and wait to hop off until I bring my hand close
| to a suitable surface.
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| Sorry dude, I'm giving them a chance with the cup and
| junk mail method. I'm not carrying one by the "silk".
| Nature is ruthless and I'm giving them a fighting chance
| :)
| adenozine wrote:
| Well that's the worst thing I've ever read
| tedunangst wrote:
| If they come far enough north, maybe we can recruit them to turn
| the tide in the war against the spotted lanternfly.
| notadoc wrote:
| Do we really need these clickbait headlines on Hacker News? For a
| while, this was a refuge from that garbage.
| karolist wrote:
| Is the TFA implying that these spiders will climb the trees and
| use their webs to lower themselves from "the sky"? Because "drop
| from the sky" brought back memories of original Red Alert 2
| trailer https://youtu.be/2YlVumsPHx4?t=80, which is now relevant
| even without the spiders. And it's scary.
| g051051 wrote:
| See https://www.newser.com/story/317794/these-giant-flying-
| spide...:
|
| > hatchlings are often spotted "flying" through the air on silk
| strands, a la the babies in Charlotte's Web
| bagels wrote:
| That part is really not addressed at all. They can fly? To what
| altitude? How does a spider even fly like this in the first
| place?
| [deleted]
| adrian_b wrote:
| A young spider makes a long silk string, which will be blown
| by the wind, together with the attached spider.
|
| Like a human who flies using a balloon, the spider does not
| have any control over the flight direction. That depends on
| the winds.
|
| However, the spider can control when to descend back to the
| ground, by gathering the silk string, like the human with the
| balloon, who can release the gas which fills the balloon.
| adrian_b wrote:
| Adult spiders become too heavy to be able to fly again.
|
| Those who fly using silk strings are very young and small.
| [deleted]
| mise_en_place wrote:
| It's interesting to see the vivid colors that they evolved to
| develop. Could it be they were mimicking poisonous spiders? To
| prevent predators from eating them.
| bhaak wrote:
| Giant alien spiders are no joke!
| flerchin wrote:
| NBD if you have clone bay though.
| R0b0t1 wrote:
| Giant alien spiders aren't real, friend. https://scp-
| wiki.wikidot.com/antimemetics-division-hub
| LandR wrote:
| Recently read a book called "There is no antimemetics
| division", pretty good book!
|
| It's based on that SCP.
| msoucy wrote:
| I'm pretty sure the author of that book actually wrote a
| lot of the Antimemetics SCP posts in the first place. It's
| certainly up their alley.
| rr808 wrote:
| You'd hope the spiders will feast on other exotic invasive
| insects like Spotted Lanternfly and Gypsy Moths but inevitably
| they will eat everything local instead.
| acchow wrote:
| Why are there so few insects and spiders in San Francisco?
|
| In any other city in the world, I encounter insects with 10-100x
| the frequency.
| iotku wrote:
| Even the insects can't afford to live there.
| xenadu02 wrote:
| There are lots of spiders in the Bay Area, including here in
| SF. But definitely fewer of other insects compared to other
| places I've lived.
|
| I think it is partially the cool weather that slows them down
| and the long dry season. It seems especially hard on the
| typical flying insects that tend to annoy people. Most of the
| insect life I've seen prefers to root around deep in the
| topsoil where it is presumably warmer and not as dry.
| ben7799 wrote:
| It's the dry climate.
|
| Western Europe is similar. Coming from New England it blew my
| mind they barely even know what insect screens are in
| France/Germany/Switzerland. Just an unbelievable lack of
| insects compared to the eastern US.
| clpm4j wrote:
| Spiders and Argentine ants. Those are the only insects I
| consistently see in SF. Nothing in comparison to the
| Southeast though... I do not miss the mosquitoes and roaches.
| throwaway2214 wrote:
| Can you eat them? I dont know why we dont eat more insects, but
| it seems super good ROI.
|
| I tried to grow crickets to make flour out of them, but it was
| much harder than I thought, those spiders seem easier, and are
| also meatier.
| vgel wrote:
| What did you find difficult about raising crickets? I remember
| as a kid I had a lizard and a cricket box for feeding and it
| was just a matter of adding cricket food and cardboard tubes
| (disregarding the one "dropped the box of crickets on the
| ground and all the crickets escaped into the kitchen" incident,
| to be fair). That said, I wasn't trying to raise human-food-
| grade crickets, lizards are probably less picky.
| danShumway wrote:
| Everything else in this comment aside, what are you planning to
| feed them if you don't want to grow bugs like crickets?
| throwaway2214 wrote:
| I was kind of hoping they find their own food :)
| danShumway wrote:
| Desperately hoping that this response means you want to
| catch them from the wild or around your property, and not
| that your house naturally contains a volume of insects
| large enough to support a nontrivial population of these
| things. :)
| nkozyra wrote:
| > They likely traveled across the globe on shipping containers,
| similar to the Bubonic plague.
|
| Yeah, I guess that counts as a "terrifying thing" if you consider
| those the two things on earth that travel across the globe on
| shipping containers.
| Buttons840 wrote:
| > [The spiders] are harmless to humans as their fangs are too
| small to break human skin
|
| I thought the whole "small fang" thing was a myth? Haven't we all
| heard of a local spider which is very poisonous but has fangs
| that are too small?
|
| Does anyone know if the "small fang" thing is true? And does the
| spider have venom if it is able to bite?
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Does anyone know if the "small fang" thing is true? And does
| the spider have venom if it is able to bite?
|
| Virtually all spiders are venomous, but many can't penetrate
| human skin and many have venom that isn't dangerous to humans
| at the dosage injected.
| friedturkey wrote:
| I once walked down a street that had hundreds of them. Being
| bored and interested in spiders, I picked up a twig to provoke
| them a bit and see how they responded.
|
| Some of them would furiously try to bite the stick and I could
| feel their fangs scraping on it. So I can't quite say whether
| they're strong enough to break the skin, but they're strong
| enough to send vibrations down a 2 foot long stick.
| khaki54 wrote:
| On the bright side, this spider eats those stink bugs that
| nothing else will touch. We will of course need something to eat
| the spiders
| jrodthree24 wrote:
| Maybe we can have some of these spiders to eat the other
| spiders.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portia_(spider)#:~:text=Portia...
| .
| bobbylarrybobby wrote:
| FYI your bing query is included in that URL (a practice which
| I detest)
| gvb wrote:
| Birds eat the spiders. Then they poop on my boat. :-/
| thecrumb wrote:
| Me Googles "how to make diy flamethrower"
| hunterb123 wrote:
| Looks similar to a banana spider, the webs nearly alike too.
|
| https://wikiless.org/wiki/Golden_silk_orb-weaver
| nkrisc wrote:
| If they're that harmless then I'm kind of hoping I find some if
| they are in fact here. They look pretty interesting.
|
| Looks like they'd make for some cool photos.
| chomp wrote:
| They won't break your skin but you'll still feel the bite.
| TobTobXX wrote:
| > To humans, the Joro Spider isn't particularly dangerous. A
| bite won't kill you. It'll hurt, though. A lot. Imagine a bee
| sting. It'll hurt where you were bitten with a blister.
| Within a day, you'll be fine.
|
| https://jorospider.com/are-joro-spiders-dangerous/
| nkrisc wrote:
| I mean that's pretty harmless if they're as non-aggressive as
| it suggest they are.
| iffycan wrote:
| They are beautiful, but they don't come one at a time. They
| make their thick webs _everywhere_ and in big groups. You can't
| escape them during spider season.
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