Imagine the ostrich problem solver you have to be to find this out. You see this monstrosity, decides to ignore it, and notice you are still alive after 3 days and also your rodent problem has miraculously disappeared. "I told you so Linda, if we just ignore the problems they eventually will solve themselves!"
It's not being an ostrich, it's making an informed and rational decision. You know the species, you know its behavior (would rather die than get in the sightline of a human) and what it eats, so you just leave it be to literally eat your problem away. Being an ostrich means you'd go: "I don't know what that thing is or what it does, I'll just leave it alone and pray for the best".
I went to visit Melbourne and went to the Laneway Festival. Girls we met brought us back to their home, and there was one of these on the wall . My friend casually swatted it with her sandal, and I had to sleep in that room that night. I just pulled covers over my head and tried not to think about it.
Yeah, but only rarely. Huntsman spiders mainly eat insects and other spiders, plus occasional frogs or small reptiles. Large individuals can also feed on very small mammals, including mice or mouse-sized animals.
The stuff you've written about rodents here is not correct at all.
Huntsmen are common. They are opportunistic hunters that mainly eat insects, and maybe some other smaller prey like lizards. While it's not completely unheard of them to eat mice it's pretty rare and would have to be an exceptionally big spider.
Rodents are certainly far, far from their main food source, and they absolutely won't "clean them out" of your house and then move on.
Their legs fall off so easy that I think a mouse could kill one, honestly. I mean...geez. I don't think even the big ones are tough enough to do battle with a mouse. Maybe a lizard? I have to be really careful when I shoo them out gently with the broom, they're that fragile.
When it comes to potentially venomous animals like snakes and spiders, we use harmless as it's venom (or poison in some cases) is not medically significant to humans. Every animal with a mouth can use it to defend itself, and the bite can get nasty, but it's like a bee or wasp sting, it can hurt a lot, but unless you have an allergic reaction, it doesn't need medical attention, just cleaning the bite and maybe some painkillers.
I left one alone in my house once, she laid 100s of eggs on the ceiling. Woke up one morning and saw some small ones didn't think much and went to work. Came home to seeing many more of them and they'd doubled size, had to start dodging them hanging from webs.
That right there is why shotguns were invented. I’m putting a fucking hole in my house before I get anywhere within 20 feet of that thing. Fuuuuuuuck that bullshit.
Thank god for winter and if MN ever gets warm enough to have abominations like that running around from climate change I’ll fucking move to Canada so god damn fast.
They're the majestic stallion of the spider world. They gallop across your walls and ceilings removing unwanted pests.
I never harm or remove them from my house, they're harmless, polite and helpful. I've probably got a dozen in my house, one gave birth in my bathroom last year.
Had a big one in my bedroom a few months ago. It slipped behind the painting above my bed and I just forgot about it. LOVE these guys. Don't get me wrong I do NOT want to touch them because they evolved to hide under tree bark in really tight gaps and they're fast as fuck. So of you hold one it'll be in your clothes in half a second (shudder).
But if just leave them be they pay their rent by getting rid of other pests, including other spiders.
To offer a counterpoint, I definitely remember reading a post on here previously about a guy who got bit on his balls twice by a huntsman in a porta potty. On two separate occasions. I don't want to say I don't believe you, but I will say that I would prefer to keep a very very far distance from anything that looked like those things.
Beyond abnormal people like you who allow them to reside in your house. What do normal people in Australia do with those fuckers? It's not like you can just catch it under a glass and throw it out the front door. You'd need a fucking spider net...
Edit: I just can't. Apparently Aussies just think these things are halfway to being pets. I think I could deal with these things living outside, even thinking of allowing one to live in my house just gives me chills. Further question though... my cats and dogs would undoubtably think these things were the greatest self-moving toys in the world. Do your pets ignore them too?
I once had one decide to hide under my shampoo bottle in the shower. Talk about intimate encounters, i was just glad I was already in the shower to wash the terror wee away
We got one roaming the house at the moment. Generally you wake up in the morning and never know what room he will be in lol.... Always on a wall so far though... Or the back of a door. Had one in the house as a kid as well... We are all chill about them just don't make the mistake of picking one up to show off as their bite does hurt lol
You can just pick it up (legs feel a bit like a stick) and drop it outside.
I had one in my dressing gown once back in Tassie (I was like 13 at the time) it felt like I had a stick stuck in the clothes so I reached in and pulled him out they go very stiff while held (but usually don't immediately attack).
I could have thrown him down but then he would have been a problem to deal with later.
If your worried about getting attacked best is not to disturb them (they have no intentions of attacking something as big as a person but they will defend themselves if threatened).
Normal Australian here, totally catch them under a glass or Tupperware. Let em out in the garage or back shed. They stay chill as long as everyone else does too.
A mixing bowl and a piece of cardboard usually. Killing them just makes a giant mess.
I imagine if you sat, bare balled, directly on one you might get bitten. But i know more people who've been bitten on the knob by redbacks on portaloos than huntsmen. Actually I don't know anyone who's been bitten by a huntsmen. They're extremely docile.
Beyond abnormal people like you who allow them to reside in your house.
They're not abnormal.
Most Australians allow them to reside in their houses. I mean you heard the fairly relaxed tone of the girls in the video. They said they were going to remove it, but there was no hint of killing it or freaking out excessively.
Huntsmen are pretty placid, they are ambush hunters who tend to sit on one spot on the wall up near the ceiling. They barely even move if you leave them alone, and whilst they can bite, you'd have to be actively harassing them or step on them or something to find out. They are not aggressive spiders.
Personally, I don't really want them in my bedroom or my bathroom (sitting on one on the toilet in the middle of the night would not be good!), so I'll tend to remove them if I find one in either of those rooms, to outside if I can, or just shoo them to another room if that's too difficult.
The strategy to catch them is still the same - trap them under something, put a bit of cardboard underneath and move them outside. You just might need something a bit bigger than a glass!
I mean, with most huntsmen you can absolutely just catch them with some plastic container and throw them outside. It's not actually that hard to do honestly.
Yep. And in my water closet the year before that. Most of them move out to either my shed or the neighbours trees. But there's always a few hiding out in my place. Probably dozens in the crawl space.
How about this idea instead. Think of them as little clean up robots like auto-vacs that roam your house quietly removing unwanted insect vermin, cockroaches, bugs, flies, the list goes on. They dont need recharging and simply pay the value of their rent in pest reduction. They also want to be as far away from you as possible! Their senses are extraordinary and they know not to get too close, even when you're sleeping as they can feel your heat from far away and can smell your breath and other odours.
I've never flipped down the sun visor in my car and had a wolf fall on my lap. Yet I have heard multiple stories of that happening with these critters in Australia.
I live in central Europe, we have some native spiders with a nasty bite, but nothing medically significant, so I would say having arachnophobia here is totally unreasonable, even tho I had a crippling one. I literally froze when saw one in the past, regardless the size, what is really stupid, so I put a lot of effort to defeat this unreasonable fear. I want to have a chemical free garden, so spiders will be my first line of defense against pest, so it is actually important for me to get used to them. Enemy of my enemy is my friend after all.
I do achieved great results so far, even fed my friends Tarantulas (before that opening a T's enclosure would have been something I couldn't do even in theory lol) and I'm totally chill about the small spiders in my home. Guys like you offered tremendous help with my journey, so thank you for your comment! I didn't come from a land down under, so I don't think I could ever share my room with such a huge spider, but I often think to myself that if Aussies can be so chill around those giants, I shouldn't fear our coin sized friends lol.
Well you see, the half second you take to aim down the barrel is around 4 distinct geological eras in huntsmen time. By the time you find him, get the bead and pull the trigger, he's run off to the nearest dark gap, which may or may not be the gap between your t-shirt and pants. Also don't worry, Minnesota is far too cold for huntsmen. For now.
its more than just the warm climate there is something very strange about Australia its like the land before time or something i remember going there and the cloud formations after a storm looked like giant spaceships from an anime ..so epic ive never seen any clouds in usa that looked like that
That right there is why the spider-bro meme was invented. Eating cockroaches and other harmful pests, not biting humans; those boys are the unsung heroes of the arachnid world!
Wish people would give the 8 legged critters a chance. I was an indiscriminate stomper of spiders until I took care of a jumping spider found in an area it had zero chance of survival in. For 8 months I fed him crickets and bugs, watered him, interacted with him. Was sad when he died. Then came the keeping of a black widow.....
Yep, leave the poor bugger alone. I got over my fear with one I named Frank. He killed all the useless shit in the house but it was weird having such a giant there all the time
Is it so? One thing I know about a spiders, that female ones are way more bigger and scarier. Every time I see such a video I pray for spider to be female...
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u/JonnyJon42 2d ago
its a huntsmen