Quote:
Originally Posted by donna323
I'm not sure, but I THINK, we had a brown recluse spider outside our front porch this summer. It was big (about the size of a dime), fat and furry, and had a violin on its back, a white one. It wove this elaborate web between a push and a porch pole.
I heard they were dangerous, so I have to admit I executed it.
I believe spiders are a good sign, mystical and magic, like the full moon. But I didn't want something around that could put my daughter in the hospital, you know?
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That would have been an Orb Weaver of some sort, probably
Araneus diadamatus, NOT a Brown Recluse. Brown Recluse spiders have these sloppy, very "abstract" webs that they spin in corners and underneath things, rather than those big aerial webs with that classic shape. There's nothing "elaborate" about a Brown Recluse web. ALso, they are not very large at all, and their "violin" marking is DARK, not white, and located on their carapace around and just behind their eyes. Brown Recluse spiders do not have white on them at all, and their hair is very, very short, barely visable even in macro photographs. Here is a really good macro(close-up)of a Brown Recluse that appeared yesterday on Deviant Art, taken by an entomologist. She is missing a front leg, but you can see that characteristic "violin", the short, fine hair, and the characteristic eye arrangment-these spiders only have six eyes, which are arranged in three pairs in such a way as to resemble a human face, with the "nose" being the middle pair of eyes. If you live within the range of the Recluse species, it's a good idea to know how to recognize them. Brown Recluse spiders are almost always found INDOORS, by the way.
http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/43184263/
pitbulllady