We haven't had a drop of rain since the 8 weeks that I am here, but...It's that time of year, the gentle sounds of summer approaching, lawnmowers, crickets, birdsong, the fizz of beer cans opening, and the shrieks of suburbanites confronted by rain spiders.
"They are among the biggest non-tarantula spiders in the world," I read about the fat-bodied long-legged Sparassidae often found indoors in the last parched weeks before the summer rains come.
They can have a legspan of up to 7cm and a head to abdomen measurement of about 3cm. They also do not like being outside in the rain and are seen as a sign of approaching rainfall. And yes indeed, we had a few already in the house and it is SCARY!! Since we didn't know if they were poisonous or not, we just went for them with a broom and killed all the life out of them! I immediately googled the spider and found they are not. They can bite you but it is more like a pin prick, but thinking of that HUGE animal running up my arm...........not a nice idea.So we already have a creepy crawler in the pool, .... a rubber one that cleans the bottom of the pool, now we have some hairy long legged 'friends' coming to visit us now and then and actually I rather wished that these friends stayed were they belong. NOT in my house! But that is part of living in South Africa I guess ;-)
Am I glad we don't have curtains yet, since they especially LOVE to hide in there!! I am just hoping that they stay away from my bed...I can handle it being on the wall, so I can see it, approach it and get rid of it.
2 comments:
Okay, Mireille, I think I would DIE at the site of them in the house! I am really freaked by bugs and ours in PA are much smaller. How are the girls handling it? You are a brave one!!
Well, you have to hear us scream... the 3 of us, and then we got the maid and she took care of it :-0, so we aren't that brave as well!!
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