What Are the Biggest Spiders That Can Be Found Under Beds?

[Ivan Seeking]

I Found these under the bed dear.

http://www.coasttocoastam.com/timages/page/camel_spider1a.jpg

See
http://www.coasttocoastam.com/gen/page440.html

 

[Chen]

I thought you were talking about hard drives for some reason. Although they don't really come in cans.

 

[Monique]

omg omg omg omg omg omg.. that is the creepiest little critter I have EVER seen! Thanks Ivan.. now I'm going to have nightmares for sure

 

[cookiemonster]

omg omg omg omg omg omg.. that is the creepiest little critter I have EVER seen! Thanks Ivan.. now I'm going to have nightmares for sure

Little?

cookiemonster

 

[tribdog]

You know she'd be a hard one to please.

 

[Kerrie]

spiders don't bug me, but this picture has given me goosebumps!

 

[tribdog]

I've only seen something like that twice before. The first time was when I was a space miner and one of those things popped out of my chest while I was about 237 million miles away from home. The second time was when I was doing some research in the Arctic and one of those things used my head as a leotard and shoved it's legs through my ears (from the inside).

 

[Monique]

Just in case, I started to clean my room. You know, béfore the spiders start to hatch..

 

[Tsu]

Go to you office! - and take your little friends with you! (dear. )

p.s.
Are those the ones that live in your eyelashes? If not, show us a picture of those! They're so CUTE!

 

[tribdog]

Go to you office! - and take your little friends with you! (dear. )

p.s.
Are those the ones that live in your eyelashes? If not, show us a picture of those! They're so CUTE!

Yeah, those live in your eyelashes. It's only temporary though, you don't need any sort of medication to get rid of them. They leave all by themselves as soon as they finish digesting your head.

 

[Tsu]

Wait! Here they are! Aren't they CUTE?? They good news seems to be that, although they LIVE in your eyelashes, they don't POOP in your eyelashes (thank GOD!) ...'course they do lay EGGS!... :P

http://www.geocities.com/thesciencefiles/eyelash/creatures.html

 

[Tsu]

They leave all by themselves as soon as they finish digesting your head.

How RUDE! I just hate mites that eat and run!

 

[tribdog]

want to hear the story about the time I got crabs?

 

[Tsu]

want to hear the story about the time I got crabs?

ummmm... SURE! Amuse us, tribdog! Lay it on THICK!

edit: anyone ever wonder about the word 'amuse'? Breaking it down, it might mean 'without a muse' - which, unless I'm mistaken (or I have a breakdown in synapse connections), has nothing to do with humor or entertainment... hmmmm... just a thought... Maybe it's the radiation I work around...

 

[tribdog]

This isn't a funny story, its a sad story.
Speaking of mites. One day about 15 years ago me and a friend took a trip to Boise, Idaho to check out the college. We rented a motel room and sat around trying to decide what we should do for fun. We got the brilliant idea to get out the yellow pages and call a couple of escorts. About an hour later these two hard-working ladies showed up and took a liking to me and my friend and soon we had a crazy little foursome going on. Yes we practiced safe sex, however, condoms do not prevent those evil vermin known as crabs from hopping from pubic hair to pubic hair. The next day my friend and I drove back to our home town.
A few days later I noticed an uncomfortable itchy sensation in a sensitive area. I had never seen crabs before, so I needed confirmation on my condition. I went into the dining room where my roommates were eating breakfast and placed my genitalia on the table. They confirmed I was afflicted with crabs and started laughing at me.
Now you have to understand I lived in a VERY small town. Everyone knew everyone else and it was 60 miles to the next nearest town. There was no way I was going to go to the local drug store for crab medicine, but I was getting desperate. I was really itching now and they were starting to bite quite regularly. I decided to drive to a truck stop outside of town in the hopes that they had some sort of cure. It turns out they didn't have what I was looking for, but as I was browsing I saw a bottle of rubbing alcohol. I remembered killing bugs for my bug collection when I was little by placing a cotton ball soaked in alcohol into a bottle with the bug. I bought a bottle and raced home.
Once I got home I raced into the bathroom, took off my clothes and straddled the toilet. As soon as the alcohol touched my skin (and I mean the very second it touched my red, raw scratched tender skin) I felt like I was on fire. I started screaming, the crabs started screaming my dog started barking Monique's smoke detector went off, I jumped in the shower and put out the fire. After that I wasn't so embarrassed about going to the drug store and I was able to kill those blood sucking parasites without any more drama. On a side note, I don't like being laughed at so before killing the crabs I picked a few of them and flicked them into my roommates' beds.

 

[tribdog]

We're still waiting for the story that you told your girlfriend...some of us out here can use the help. LOL

I said "Honey, do you remember that time I went to Idaho and called an escort service and you came over and I gave you that $50? Give me back at least half, cause you gave me crabs"

 

[Evo]

Wait! Here they are! Aren't they CUTE?? They good news seems to be that, although they LIVE in your eyelashes, they don't POOP in your eyelashes (thank GOD!) ...'course they do lay EGGS!... :P

http://www.geocities.com/thesciencefiles/eyelash/creatures.html

Gee, THANKS Tsunami! I had managed to forget about these things.

 

[einsteinian77]

didn't they eat those things on Fear Factor while still alive? the spiders that is

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I like part of the internet legend that goes with this picture: You go numb when the little buggers bite you. That way you can't feel them eating your arm off while you are sleeping.

I think these Camel Spiders are also known as Nederland Night Crawlers.

Monique, I don't think I have ever met a biologist who is creeped out by a little spider. Gees.

 

[Monique]

Monique, I don't think I have ever met a biologist who is creeped out by a little spider. Gees.

Hey, you knów I once got attacked by a flesh eating spider! These ones look just like it..

 

[LURCH]

Hey, you knów I once got attacked by a flesh eating spider! These ones look just like it..

At least they ain't Michigan Crickets !

These really are impressive critters, but are they true spiders? I was under the impression that the giant tarantula of Central America was the largest arachnid, but these things look much larger.

 

[tribdog]

No they aren't really true spiders, but are you going to tell them that? I'm not! they call themselves spiders I'm not going to argue.

 

[Monique]

here's one up close.. you decide whether it looks like a spider or not.. I for one.. don't really care! :S

http://www.defence.gov.au/news/raafnews/editions/4509/images/camel%20spider%2001-2.jpg

 

[tribdog]

I refuse to touch the screen when that picture is on there. I won't even type any numbers with that on the screen because I don't want my fingers to get too close.

 

[jimmy p]

bears a certain resemblance to Tony Blair... NO WAIT! It's my ex-girlfriend!

 

[Monique]

Your ex looks like tony blair?
hm.. I'm starting to see you in a different light now Jimmy..

 

[jimmy p]

lol... its more the bug resemblance than anything... when i see Tony Blair and my ex, i get this strange desire to squash them..

 

[Ivan Seeking]

More information about this...including how to care for them

Camel spiders can grow to be as large as dinner plates.

Camel spiders can traverse desert sand at speeds up to 25 MPH, making screaming noises as they run.

Camel spiders can jump several feet in the air.

Camel spiders eat the stomachs of camels, hence the name "camel spider." (Legend includes the detail that camel spiders eat camel stomachs from either the outside in or the inside out. In the former case they supposedly jump up from the ground and grab onto camels' bellies from underneath; in the latter case exactly how spiders allegedly as large as dinner plates get into camels' stomachs intact remains unexplained.)

Camel spiders are venomous, and their venom contains a powerful anesthetic that numbs their victims (thus allowing them to gnaw away at living, immobilized animals without being noticed). U.S. soldiers were said to have been attacked by camel spiders at night but remained completely unaware of their plight until they awakened in the morning to find chunks of their flesh missing.

According to most spider experts, these claims are all false. Camel spiders (so named because, like camels, they can be found in sandy desert regions) grow to be moderately large (about a 5" leg span), but nowhere near as large as dinner plates; they can move very quickly in comparison to other arthropods (a top speed of maybe 10 MPH), but nothing close 25 MPH; they make no noise; and they capture prey without the use of either venom or anesthetic. Camel spiders rely on speed, stealth, and the (non-venomous) bite of powerful jaws to feed on small prey such as other arthropods (e.g., scorpions, crickets, pillbugs), lizards, and possibly mice or birds. They use only three pairs of legs in running; the frontmost pair (called pedipalpa) is held aloft and used in a similar manner to the antennae of insects. Camel spiders shun the sun and generally hide during the day, coming out at night to do their hunting. [continued]

http://www.snopes.com/photos/bugs/camelspider.asp#add

 

[Tsu]

Yeah? Well I can traverse desert sands at 11 mph making screaming noises as I run!

Clearly, you are the superior entity!
Ivan, would you put that thing back under the bed, please!? The dust rhinos need to be tamed again.

 

[jimmy p]

It's the camel's faults for being stupid enough to eat the spiders in the first place...

 

[tho]

ok, it's been a long while...

ok, it's been a long while since any of y'all posted this stuff, but i found this page through Google and others might too...

first of all, these aren't really spiders... they are arachnids, which means they're in the same 'class' as spiders and scorpions (eight legs etc.), and in some places folks call them camel spiders or sun spiders, but they aren't spiders... their scientific-sounding name varies too, but most call them solifugids (some say solifugid singular, solifugae plural)

i'm only taking the time to correct this because this is one of my favorite critters...

look at those jaws... they were the inspiration for the aliens in the movie Predator... these critters have powerful jaws which can move in multiple directions, thus enabling them to grab on with their pincers and literally tear things apart... personally i nominate them to be the model for land-roving robots rather than ants or spiders which others seem to favor...

seriously, i studied these critters as models for robots when i was a grad student in computer science... i started studying spiders but found that as a species their whole evolution centered around their silk-spinning ability - or lack thereof, as in the case of the wolf spiders who seem like another nice candidate for robotic model, but they lack the superior grappling capability of the solifugids...

when i studied these critters (a long time ago), i read stories of soldiers (probably Brits) in the middle-east desert who would throw scorpions in with their pet solifugids and watch the solifugids literally rip the scorpions a new one... sorry, american slang... in a stand-up fight against scorpions, the solifugids would rip their poisonous opponent to shreds and then devour them... got to admire that

as noted by others here and elsewhere, solifugids are not poisonous... they are not the flesh-eating spiders of the desert... there really are flesh-eating spiders in the desert that numb their victims' flesh and then proceed to gnaw on them... very nasty if you're sleeping and they choose to eat your eyeball (*shudder*)... but the real flesh-eating spiders are pretty little blue things, very colorful, not the nightmarish vision as seen in the pictures here...

be sure to see the Wikipedia articles on: Solifugae and Arachnid

as a small note of scientific interest (from the Wiki), there are 900 species of solifugids, 2,000 species of scorpions, and 40,000 species of spiders... that silk-spinning trick has been a big winner, evolutionarily-speaking... i still favor the solifugids, though they are the stuff my nightmares are made of...

(side note: Wiki, as of this posting, is conflicted in that Arachnid article over the number of species of mites and ticks... in one place it notes 30,000 species of mites and ticks, closely followed thereafter with an estimate of 50,000 known, possibly a million total species... got to love Wiki... it's all almost true, almost all of it)

 

[Chi Meson]

Solid first post, tho

I say he gets a flounder, right away.

 

[turbo]

Solid first post, tho

I say he gets a flounder, right away.

You're right. He does not deserve the fresh Portuguese Man-O-War or a smack with a frozen swordfish. Given the quality of the post, maybe MIH will smack him lightly with a sardine and take him out for sushi. The "y'all" means that either MIH or Evo should administer the greeting.

 

[Mk]

Forget about hitting him with it, how about we fry it up and feed it to him with some hush puppies and fries!

 

[Evo]

Solid first post, tho

I say he gets a flounder, right away.

Maybe, if he returns, sounded like a hit and run <clutches her precious flounder>