Big Spider

[Ken L]

When I was a boy, my parents had a caravan and on the site, there was a toilet/shower block.
In this shower block, I once saw the biggest spider that I've ever seen in the UK and it frightened the bejesus out of me.
It was as big as my (boy's) hand and had distinct cream and brown banding on its legs, much like the common garden orb web spider - only much, much bigger.
I've only ever seen one other, and that was a few weeks later. It was about half the size of the first one, and it was on that same caravan site.
After something like 45 years, I think I've solved the mystery.
Do you know what this is?

 

[chesters1]

if my mrs spotted it........dead!

no idea but i have seen one spider once in my life a wasp spider, may not have got that far up yet!

At a campsite as a kid the bogs were just a corregated iron hut little larger in diameter than the bog (a round drum with a seat on it to hide the horrors left by previous visitors once they rise above the blue chemical that supposedly  did something to them !)with a door that was shorter than the opening letting the reek out!

Nothing worse than sitting doing your business and a huge spider dropping down to face level ! And they were BIG ,a swipe at the spider hopefully stunning it and a swipe at your butt with damp bog paper and you were out of there finished or not!

Edited May 2, 2021 by chesters1

[Ken L]

The big girl is the pic is a Cardinal Spider (Tegenaria parietina), the UK's biggest spider by size.

The Fen Raft Spider is heavier though.

My worst bog spider experience was when I got food poisoning in Thailand and was staying in a bungalow with an outside squat toilet across the yard. I REALLY needed to go every 20 minutes or so, and the first time I opened the bog door after dark, I was confronted by a huge black "racing tarantula". He was in the corner, so I edged past and did what needed to be done. Every time I went in, he was in a different spot, until I ended up squatting there with him six inches from my face.

[BoldBear]

I’m now not so spooked by spiders however; when I was in the RN and we volunteered for survival training over the Christmas period in the Malayan jungle back in 1972 and were setting up our mosquito nets in our tent my mate had a huge spider (I think it might have been a bird eating spider) run up his back and jump right onto me and my first instinct was to try and shake it off which I managed to do. We spent ages after trying to find the spider but we couldn’t find it anywhere.

later when we were off to a waterfall for a swim I brushed my shoulder against a black bush and was showered in huge black ants which clung to my skin even after diving into the water, I didn’t get bitten or suffer from acid from them though, but it was quite scary.

And we had to dig very small ditches around our tents because we were told that snakes would normally rather go around them rather than across them.

we were told that back in the war they used to put praying mantises and spiders and Bombay runners etc. Into an upturned sailor hat and bet on the insect that was left alive after they fought, which was usually a praying mantice.

A few years ago in England we had received some railway equipment boxes from our Australian branch and unfortunately they had venomous Redback spider eggs in them which hatched out and we had them appearing all over the place; we had to have the whole place fumigated and checked afterwards.

keith.

 

 

Edited May 2, 2021 by BoldBear

[chesters1]

If my mrs spotted it it would be nothing more than a mark ! We only let daddy long legs live indoors thefes thousands of acres outside for the rest 

[Bobj]

We get a lot of these in the garden, the huntsman spider, Hoconia immanis. Had 2 of them scuttle over my hand as I was lifting a clump of strap ferns.

 

[Ken L]

47 minutes ago, Bobj said:

We get a lot of these in the garden, the huntsman spider, Hoconia immanis. Had 2 of them scuttle over my hand as I was lifting a clump of strap ferns.

 

I once watched a group of four absolutely terrified UK tourists being "chased" along a pavement by a really big Huntsman in Byron Bay.

It'd obviously been disturbed somehow and was just trying to find cover, but there were shops on one side and a curb on the other, so it just ran along.

I think I'd be more worried about mouse spiders if I was rummaging about in ferns in your neck of the woods.

[corydoras]

On 5/2/2021 at 10:17 AM, Ken L said:

When I was a boy, my parents had a caravan and on the site, there was a toilet/shower block.
In this shower block, I once saw the biggest spider that I've ever seen in the UK and it frightened the bejesus out of me.
It was as big as my (boy's) hand and had distinct cream and brown banding on its legs, much like the common garden orb web spider - only much, much bigger.
I've only ever seen one other, and that was a few weeks later. It was about half the size of the first one, and it was on that same caravan site.
After something like 45 years, I think I've solved the mystery.
Do you know what this is?

 

Tegenaria parietina

[corydoras]

23 hours ago, Bobj said:

We get a lot of these in the garden, the huntsman spider, Hoconia immanis. Had 2 of them scuttle over my hand as I was lifting a clump of strap ferns.

 

When my cousin lived in Eucla she was was out in her ute one day. The sun was getting in her eyes so she flipped down her sun visor. When she did a big huntsman fell into her lap. Now she always flips down the sun visors before getting into a vehicle.

[Bobj]

43 minutes ago, corydoras said:

When my cousin lived in Eucla she was was out in her ute one day. The sun was getting in her eyes so she flipped down her sun visor. When she did a big huntsman fell into her lap. Now she always flips down the sun visors before getting into a vehicle.

Ahh, Eucla, not too many live there, I believe it is almost hidden by drift sand dunes. Well, when I visited in 1963.

Huntsmen are known to favour cars as a hiding place.