Sunday, March 16, 2008

An invasion or more likely a visit by sunspiders.
I was busy on the computer when I heard a rustling in the papers next to the computer and moving my eyes over I looked smack into this face not even a mother can get used to.
This spider belong to a separate group of arachnids called solifugids (sun spiders or Solfugidae). They are not poisonous and at home in dry countries from South Africa up to Asia and beyond.
We like our creepy-crawlies and even though I know that this spider known here as the roman (or sun spider) is not poisonous, I could not help to cry out and pull my legs onto the chair.

I got my wits back as these spiders are extremely fast and long gone before I even caught my breath. I made my way to Rudi to tell him the news when he smiled and pointed to a smaller one running along the wall. We counted four different sizes so there were at least four.
This is an invasion. We are lucky to see one at a time in Namibia, lived here for years and years and suddenly we have them all around.
We saw at least one every night for about ten days. Then they were gone. It is now six+ months later and we did not see one again.
I was wondering. Could it be that the silkworms attracted them? But then the silkworms were still around at different stages of development for more than a month and I could not notice that many of them were missing. A few I would not notice I acknowledge that.
The spiders were a treat so they are welcome if they took some worms.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hey Eurica,
thank you for visiting my blog. Now I've come here to see your nice fotos and what do I see first: spiders - iiihhh. I don't like spiders at all - my feelings are near to arachnophobia (don't know, if one say so in english but I think you understand). You are German or your parents are? I saw your ...name (was ist nun Familienname? I think, I read it so often on forms)- surname? - Teichmann?
Well, I now will see all the other fotos on your blog - without spiders I hope ;-)