Speaking of Spider Invasion

[Holldoll]

I was sitting at my kitchen table today looking at the pond while feeding my daughter breakfast.  All the sudden, something moved and caught my eye. . .   

In the second picture you can see it's size in relation to the milk jug! I almost threw up! I'm all for leaving mother nature outside, you stay in your house, I'll stay in mine, but this one had to go! My daughter chases everything that moves and if she stumbled upon this is could get nasty.  He's in a heavenly home now with LOTS of bugs to eat. 

Anyone know what it is?

[mondotomhead]

YIKES!!

It looks like a baby tarantula.  I still would of caught it and thrown it over the wall.  It is just to big to squish.

[Holldoll]

DH sprayed him with wasp spray to stun him and then drove a stake through him.  Poor spider, but my skin is still crawling!!!

After doing some searching it's a tarantula.  It's probably a full grown male.  3" body 3-5" legs.  I can handle most bugs and snakes, but I have a thing about spiders and this one has completely freaked me out!!

[Mikey]

I didn't know you had tarantulas up where you live.  When I was a kid we lived inland in Riverside and I used to catch them and play with them.  We took a cotton ball soaked with ammonia and placed the cotton ball next to their burrow and then put a Mason jar over the hole & cotton ball.  The fumes would bring the tarantula up out of the hole and then would would scoop it up into the Mason jar.  They were aggressive at first due to this treatment but after a few minutes they were calm enough to handle.  They were actually quite docile and I never got bit....   As an adult I now would never consider handling one......   

[Holldoll]

I didn't know we had them either!  My next door neighbor just told me last year they had 5 IN their house! No thank you! Orkin is coming tomorrow to spray the house. 

[Esther]

Holldoll. I'm with you on that one. I'm all for live and let live on every other creature on this earth but just can't abide with a spider. Outside, mmmmmm, OK I guess but my instinct still wants to kill them. INSIDE, they are not living if I have to take an hour to screw up the courage and figure out how to get 'em, I'll do it. But something that size is horrible to imagine. Fortunately in Michigan, we don't have any large spiders and not many snakes and very few are poisonous. We do have the brown recluse spiders though.

[jw]

My DH hates them and I have to round them up and put them outside before he threatens them  . But then we don't have any poisonous ones here. We were in Cali. one year when we stopped to visit a scenic view spot and the parking lot was full of cars.............I spied one of those big tarantula looking spiders and thought I must save him from getting squished by a car so I found a piece of card board and went trying to scoop him up so as to put him out of harms way. Well DH spied me and had a freakin fit............took me away from my rescue............always wondered if the poor thing made it out alive. See I don't mind the dry creatures........it's those gross slugs and worms I run from  . My niece was living in New Zea land for a bit and she took this picture of a huge spider on the wall  . 

[aravenschild]

hey, we got tarantulas here in southern Missouri, so I guess they can live just about anywhere. Unfortunately we just don't see them as often as we use to do to all the construction in the area............... sure miss the hairy little beasts. My son would even let them crawl on his hand and arms when he found them, I guess they trusted him, cause he never got bit.