Unwanted Australian Migrant.

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My car sits out in the backyard all week, and gets covered in spiderwebs, if it's lucky every month or 2 and I'll give it a wash, that gets rid of then for a day or two. They don't concern me, although it makes the car look unloved...enough of that, we don't go there. One of my daughters has a bad case of arachnophobia, and of course she has passed that onto her daughter.

So the granddaughter and I get into the Volvo this morning, and she freaks out, there is a spider on the door sill. ''It's a White Tail !'' she says. I take a look - ''Yeah...nah, that's not a White Tail.'' 'You sure ?' ''Positive.'' After she gets out I take a closer look, and it's a White Tail alright, protecting her eggs.




I hit it with some engine start...that gets her going, for awhile. Then I finish off with Simple Green because I'm a Hippy at heart. Car washed today, inside the doors too. Looks like I need to get some sort of spider killer better than engine start.

The White Tail is an Australian spider, and has apparently been here for a long time, but they have only become really common in the last couple of decades, before that I'd never heard of them. Their bites are really bad, and it can takes years for them to heal. But experts say it's not the spider's bite, but bacteria on it's fangs that causes the ulceration. I may have been bitten by one, in bed. I woke up, and it felt like sunday morning after a drinking session, but it was wednesday and I hadn't been drinking. Off to work as per normal, and a couple of days later I've got sore and stiff muscles in my arms and back. Oh, must've been working a bit hard I thought, but I hadn't really. A week later I'm scratching my back, have a look and I see I've been bitten, and the weeks symptoms make sense.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-n...es-new-resident

https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/1010...pider-speak-out

My arachnophobic daughter lives close an Auckland suburb famous for a monster spider...called the Avondale spider, the town centre is all about the spider, sculpture and stuff. She found one in her bathroom - we get the full pantomime of how big it was what she did with it. They are harmless of course, but, but...
 
Yep, that's one for sure.

We know a lady in town who had shocking skin grafts as a result.

Manuka honey, with a high potency factor is a must if they start to ulcerate.
 
Lots of nasty bugs in Oz/NZ.

I'd never make it there. Might need to hire a 5 year old kid to protect me from the creepy crawlies.
 
Ive seen a huge black widow spider make its way into the cab of my grandmas car
And make a Web right at the top of the seatbelt...where you throw your hand up
To grab the buckle...hahahaha
She didnt even notice but i did lol
Perhaps maybe spray a little bug poison
right in the doorsill?
 
Originally Posted By: Insertcoolname
Ive seen a huge black widow spider make its way into the cab of my grandmas car


I think I could run out the back and photo at least 10 Redbacks...that's Aussie Black widows, they are everywhere.
 
The New Zealand Red Back or Black Widow is called the Katipo (night stinger) and lives in grasses in sand dunes. So not often you come across them, and the bite usually not fatal, although there have been deaths.
 
Eeew!!!
Good luck to you my friend!!!
shocked.gif
i cant even imagine
 
Doing a bit of google reshearch, and the Avondale Spider is a Huntsman, and was introduced from Australia in 1924. Pretty localised for many years. They like their spider in Avondale...

800px-Avondale_Spider_Sculpture_Auckland.jpg
 
Originally Posted By: Insertcoolname
Eeew!!!
Good luck to you my friend!!!
shocked.gif
i cant even imagine


went out and found one...it's a bit hot in the usual places, so all webs and eggsacks, hiding spiders.

Here's their favouritest place in Australia, the water meter pit, where the tap is to turn the house water off...didn't eant to get the tool, but knew I'd find one.

It's a typical nest with egg sacks, and where the pipe leaves the pit to the left of the pic, you can see it's shiny black posterieor.

 
Unfortunately my ancestors didn't have much say - I think the Court decided for them!!
smile.gif
Living somewhere without snakes is my idea of heaven.
 
Poisonous snakes and other dangerous reptiles I could handle, but a spider getting you is really out of your control IMO.
 
Spiders and snakes yuck. When I lived in Palo Cedro California there were lots of Black Widow spiders and A few Rattle Snakes. Stomp and shovel!
 


Dunno what got me, but getting ready for work Monday (60 hours ago), with bathtowel over my arm, felt a series of sharp needle points, and warm, intense immediate itching.

Ended up with a "bite" area about 2-1/2" long by just under an inch wide that raised up hot and itchy by about 1/16".

Look at the two "dots" closest to the penny, and then you can track and arc, across the lower part of the image, then another starting mid way along it and overlapping...

Spider, no idea what sort, as I was busy throwing stuff on the floor and cursing.

Looking heaps better than yesterday, rubbing isocool (70% IPA) into it every couple hours, and an essential oil mix of teatree, clove, cinnamon, and citrus midway between that, and an antiseptic soap.

The swelling and large red area is gone, and the pustules left behind are popping and drying up.
 
The wierd weather is causing a bug outbreak here. Big black crickets are everywhere...get up in the moring and there are 3 in the sink, bring the doors down at work and it's raining crickets. This time of the year my lawn should be dead, and I take the mower out to mow dust and seed heads. I mowed last week, and a week later it's thick and over grown again. Out mowing tonight, along the fence where the passionfruit had died again, and POW !!! Stung in the head by a wasp, there is a paper wasp nest in there, as there is every year. They are getting into my roof too, I bet there is a big nest up there. They chew up the No More Gaps.
 
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