I’ve always been careful to teach our kids that huntsmen are not only safe but valuable spiders to have in the house. We’ve lived with both huntsmen and red backs, and while redbacks are secretive buggers who hide in the woodpile or shed, huntsmen proudly wander about on the walls above reach. When the oldest ones were small they used to announce “hunty’s” return after winter. I could never bring myself to tell them “hunty” was probably a daughter of last year’s spider.
While we routinely get the usual grey/brown ones, up to about 12cm across, I took this photo of a Badge Huntsmen (Neosparassus) next to our front door - the only time I’ve ever seen one.
Redbacks are pretty dangerous to the little ones. My best friend was hospitalised when she was bitten as a toddler. Apparently it was touch and go there for awhile. We are really lucky, one of our neighbours is a pest exterminator and he periodically sprays the outside of our place against redbacks without charging us.
Beware the Bunny Harvestman from Ecuador! I don’t know if it’s actually dangerous of not, but it’ll weird you out, and then you’ll get stuck in technical discussions that it’s not really a spider…
“Huntsman spiders of many species sometimes enter houses. They are also notorious for entering cars, and being found hiding behind sun visors or running across the dashboard.”
This has always seemed like the kind of movie I would like to see, but I have always had trouble getting past the LACK OF A HYPHEN IN THE TITLE. There are how many freaks with legs? Eight of them? Doesn’t sound like that many.
