Discussion»Questions»Animals (Wild)» Dang...another spider bite. I go out of my way not to kill them and this is what I get. Why don't they love me anymore?
Petting a jumping spider is very difficult. They usually just jump away. Here is my favorite. Phidippus audax. Quite pretty and the can get quite large. (2 cm)
Were you sleeping, Element? They tend to frown and sometimes bite when you roll over on them. It's good you don't kill them. I put them outside too. We do have one named "Wolfman Jack" who lives in the upper right corner of our living room window. She has lived there for a long time. Neither Don nor I have disturbed her. She doesn't bother us. In fact, she catches a lot of other bugs that would.
We think "Wolfman Jack" is a Wolf Spider, hence, her name. I haven't done any research on them but she is pretty big. Many would have probably killed her by now. We figured, since Don has the ladder at the job site and she hasn't bitten us yet, why not co-exist? I'm not sure Wolf Spiders even bite people on the natch. In all due respect to the spider world, I think anything would try and protect themselves if afraid of being rolled on. ;)
Just a comment---When I was in my early 20's, I had the privilege and pleasure of watching an argiope grow from the size of less than dime to the size of a 50 cent piece (body size) over a summer. I checked on him every few days. Except for repairing when food was caught, he never had to re-do his web.
I have only seen argiopes here a few times and they never seem to grow very much. We had two in our bushes this year. I went out of my way not to disturb them.
This one had built his web at eye level close to a 40 watt bulb that was frequently on at night. He literally had parked himself next to the insect buffet table. I was the only human that went into the area and I made sure not to disturb him.
I'm sure his abundant food supply explained the rapid growth.
When I was stationed in Bremerton, WA years ago, we had a beautiful orb web with a large spider stretching across the outside of our kitchen window. In the background was Mt. Ranier. I took a pic but my ex has it.
This post was edited by WM BARR . =ABSOLUTE TRASH at September 22, 2017 11:03 PM MDT
WM BARR . =ABSOLUTE TRASH 