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creepy crawlies

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 1:24 pm
by KarlM
Eight Legged Freak - 56k beware, its a big pic

That piece of wood its on is 5 inches across.

This summer my house has been over run with these buggers, varying in size from 2 to 4 inches across!

Anybody know a way to get rid of em?

Re: creepy crawlies

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 1:28 pm
by bstardchild
KarlM wrote:Eight Legged Freak - 56k beware, its a big pic

That piece of wood its on is 5 inches across.

This summer my house has been over run with these buggers, varying in size from 2 to 4 inches across!

Anybody know a way to get rid of em?
Move house would be my other halfs reply!!!

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 1:38 pm
by Si_GTi
1. glass | postcard or similar | catch and remove to outside the house - out of a window is OK cos the little buggers will parachute down by spreading their legs out, I have been reliably informed...

2. *stamp*... ooh, theres one! *stamp stamp* ... and another... etc etc etc.

3. hoover...?

4. pest control | fumigation | hole in wallet

Beyond those... pass. I don't much like spiders...

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 1:51 pm
by The Drummer
I always favour the hoover. I was infested with ants this year, they were everywhere! Luckily the girlfriend was out at the time otherwise she would ahve fainted!!! Anyway, I hoovered the little bleeders up, emptied the bag, took it outside and watched it burn!! :D

Nice! Smokey.......

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 3:22 pm
by KarlM
I tried hoovering that one up - it wouldn't fix up the nozzle! :shock:

And I couldn't find a glass big enough... Ended up using and old copy of Top Gear magazine rolled up (nice and thick). I can honestly say i have never heard crunch like that did. I mean the poor thing really put its heart into making me feel guilty - and did a stirling job of spreading its remains 10 inches in all directions.

The problem is my back garden backs onto a nature reserve (Rother Valley if anyone knows it) and so we frequently get collections of weird animals. Last year it was Dragonflys, year before it was wasps and the year before foxes :? . If we get in an exterminator they'll be back again next summer.

I've been told that if you spray a mixture of Clove oil and water around the place that will deter them as they can't stand the smell. Anyone know anymore about this?

Found another one (a little bit smaller) this morning, they aren't half fast little buggers.

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 4:17 pm
by chubbster
its just a big ol' house spider, you dont need to do anything. they live normally in the corner of your garage, shed etc and do no harm, if anything they do good by eating silverfish and other pests. it just comes to autumn and the big males get randy and go off in search of the females. thats why you see them legging around your house, cos there horny. soon as theyve mated they either die (by female digestive juices) or go back to their haunts til next autumn. theyll be gone in a few weeks.

never heard about the clove oil, but i do know that mozzys hate lavender oil so its probably true about the cloves

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 4:42 pm
by polopowah
agreed

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 4:53 pm
by david burton
This strikes a note with me too - caught one of these (about 4 inches leg to leg) last night - we had them last year. Have decided this year to bin them and make sure they die / go to the tip.

Evil things (not really) but I don't like being surprised by one (not too horny for humans) in my living room.

Also had many many ants this year - and a nice collection of hatched flying ones in my conservatory!

little ones love nipon juice (not powder) and die within 3 days. flying ones? erm - fry em!

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 5:52 pm
by chubbster
dont know to much about entomology but im pretty sure is just a big ol' house spider Tegenaria domestica. it could possibly be Tegenaria atrica which grows abit bigger. the enlarge mandables are actually palps used by the male (females dont have em, so you can sex the bastards) to pass sperm packages to the female. mandable means jaw or in a spiders case fangs which you cant see in the piccy

heres a link to more of the beasts

http://www.arkive.org/species/ARK/inver ... domestica/

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 7:08 pm
by Tahrey1043
three words


big.
motherf***ing.
hammer.

That's if you don't like them of course, for whatever reasons. Personally, unless you're worried about eating it in your sleep or have other people around who SCREAM at anything that isn't either human, or furry and between the size of an alsatian and a guinea pig, i'd say just let it be... and you won't have to get the Raidâ„¢ out again!

(who does like clove oil anyway?)

mmmm... dragonflies.

Flying ants are great if they're in between the slabs in your back garden - at 7pm on a sunny august evening, it's like heathrow airport, when they all fly off to bonk / nest somewhere. One floating off into the air in one of two fairly rigid directions about every 10 seconds like clockwork. Pretty fantastic to watch.

Bastards if you're working on a bar however - they're attracted to sugary stuff, so they home in on the JD and Southern Comfort optics, the baileys bottle, set up nests in the coke machine :shock: ... get a bottle of squirty cleaner out and NUKE THE BUGGERS (a lot less hardcore than wasps, too, you can literally blast them out of the sky and they're dead before they hit the ground... wasps require a determined campaign of squirting about half a bottle directly at one grounded insect!)

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2004 11:12 pm
by chubbster
makes me look like a nutta now youve edited that polopowah! :lol:

Posted: Sat Sep 04, 2004 1:09 am
by Criz
Looks like a wolf spider to me. Used to get em in the warehouse all the time. They like dry warm places so once in your house their gonna stay.

And they do get very big, huge infact.

Image

Image

Posted: Sat Sep 04, 2004 1:34 am
by chubbster
holy sh*t now thats a spider! yours is defientely a wolf spider the others not. dont mean to sound like i know it all but im an invertebrate fan. ive kept a fair few tarantulas and other inverts. sadly i only have one beast at the mo

heres a link to a caresheet on my little fella

http://www.petbugs.com/caresheets/S-subspinipes.html

Posted: Sat Sep 04, 2004 1:38 am
by chubbster
in fact criz if you come across one of them chuck it in a box PM me and then i'll give you some cash to send it to me. cheers. now im sounding like a nutta :oops:

Posted: Sat Sep 04, 2004 12:00 pm
by Tahrey1043
Good God thats a far more frightening picture!
Does it chew up curtains to make webs with?