At last, I’m useful! I was called to a colleague’s office because a big ol’ spider was squatting on their papers, staring at them, so I was summoned to capture the beast. I wasn’t too useful, though, since it fled under the desk and we couldn’t find it again. But later a brave student, Sophie, encountered it and scooped it up, and here it is. It’s Agelenopsis, a grass spider, perfectly harmless, but good sized for its species.
I will remind everyone that we’re hiring an ecologist, and one of the bonuses of working here is that I’ll be at your beck and call to handle any office spiders. Or if I fail, we have many bold strong students who are not at all intimidated by monstrous creatures.
Harmless to humans, you mean. Otherwise, I’m sure there’s some critter out there that violently disagrees with you (or would, if it wasn’t being eaten by spiders).
A nice pic!
Pshaw… don’t ask for a spider to be removed, just give it a name and consider it your new pet. A pet that munches other critters you would rather not have in your house.
In this house any spider on the ceiling is called “Fred.” Every other month we vacuum the cobwebs on the ceiling and windows trim.
chris:
A fine sentiment, until you find that first egg-sack. Also, I am no arachnophobe, but I’ve sure seen some spiders that scare the bejesus out of me.
I particularly remember one, largish, black, armored, and fanged. No idea of the actual species, but instinctively I knew that was definitely eviction material!
(Chooks also like spiders, by the way. And grubs and caterpillars and other things, which you probably would rather not have in your house. But I would still evict them)
The Doc might get a thrill out of the fact that according to the news ,British homes are being overrun by masses of spiders
Don’t know if having three cats has anything to do with it ,but i don’t see as many spiders as i did before i became staff to moggies .
What makes you think that an ecologist would need a cell biologist to capture a spider? If you ask nicdely, I’m sure any self-respecting ecologist will bring you the spider her/himself.
Yeah, and a lot of ecologists would be better at the taxonomy than I am.
John Morales, I have seen several egg sacks. They don’t bother me. After a while they just get sucked into a vacuum cleaner as part of general cleaning. Cobwebs seem to happen inside can lights and corners on the ceiling.
We get large spiders popping up during mating season. They are usually male spiders looking for love in all the wrong places. If you have an issue with large English house spiders, stay away from the Pacific Northwest: https://blog.zoo.org/2014/10/spiders-are-best.html