Marguerite
Active Member
I can deal with the snake (non-venomous) but I do hve a problem with spiders. I beleive tarantulas are bigger than our funnerlwebs andalsos a lot less venomous. But as a Sydney-raised girl (from the days when funnelweb spiders were only known in one very small area of north Sydney) I'm conditioned to react to anything small, shiny and black with 8 short stubby legs. Our funnelweb spiders are aggressive, too - they'll go for you if they think you're a threat. Their fangs will go through leather gauntlets and the venom can kill in half an hour. However, first aid is to bandage tightly over the bite and do not let off the pressure, because if you can keep the venom near the bite site and not let it into the bloodstream, your body will begin to break it down in fifteen minutes.
A good thing, too. Nasty. And they're common as dirt in an increasingly wide area around Australia.
So don't show me tarantulas.
When I was studying spiders etc at uni, they gave us spiders preserved in plastic, embedded in a block of polyester resin. You could get your face up close to really examine the fangs, the spinnerets, every bristle on each leg - and I needed a strong drink to be able to do it, even knowing the spider was dead and stuck in a block of plastic.
Marg
A good thing, too. Nasty. And they're common as dirt in an increasingly wide area around Australia.
So don't show me tarantulas.
When I was studying spiders etc at uni, they gave us spiders preserved in plastic, embedded in a block of polyester resin. You could get your face up close to really examine the fangs, the spinnerets, every bristle on each leg - and I needed a strong drink to be able to do it, even knowing the spider was dead and stuck in a block of plastic.
Marg