A couple of weeks ago, a friend of mine repeated the myth that daddy-longlegs are the most venomous arachnids of all, but that their "fangs" were too small to pierce human skin. I had to set her straight- the opiliones lack venom glands, so they aren't poisonous at all. You want to most venomous arachnid of all? Smut's got that covered.
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I used to find daddy longlegs' creepy when they found their way into my apartment in Levittown, probably via the bushed they management set right outside each window. But that was before I became acquainted with house centipedes in my current domicile, which move even faster and have even more legs, with a certain dragon-like head movement as they go. Both of them scavenge other household critters, but... um...they are so, so creepy when you are not expecting to see them all up on your walls and whatnot.
But that was before I became acquainted with house centipedes in my current domicile, which move even faster and have even more legs, with a certain dragon-like head movement as they go. Both of them scavenge other household critters, but... um...they are so, so creepy when you are not expecting to see them all up on your walls and whatnot.
The house centipedes really are something. Those absurdly long legs are disconcerting.
When I worked in corporate America, I had a surprisingly eccentric group of co-workers. One of my co-workers brought in a house centipede that she'd caught in her sink and gave it as a gift to a co-worker who could have passed as my demented female twin. She named it "Larry" and kept it in a jar at her desk.
She badgered me to bring in a "bug" for Larry- I was the "bug guy". I finally caught a wolf spider in my bathroom and brought it in in a jar that had originally contained crushed red pepper. I dubbed it the "Cajun spice" spider. Other co-workers of ours started placing bets on the outcome of a spider-centipede duel. It was no contest, though... it was as if Larry had been shot out of a cannon. Cajun Spice Spider never stood a chance. It was a pyrrhic victory for Larry, though... he died a couple of days after the battle royale.
See, I had vaguely imagined that Opiliones do the indirect sperm transfer business with a spermatophore like most arachnids, but the Gazoogle informs me that they are happier conducting the transfer directly.
I am happy with most invertebrates but centipedes exceed my threahold for squick.
B^4's anecdote reminds me of the time when I was sharing a flat with Mike Tarsitano, who was at the time researching Portia, a truly wonderful genus of hunting spider about which I have not blogged sufficiently. Each day he would do his rounds of the flat, trapping different varieties of house spiders which he would take to the lab to intodruce to his Portia specimens and see which hunting strategies they used... or at least that was his excuse for the Renfield behaviour.
It was a pyrrhic victory for Larry, though...
SPARTA!!!!
~
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