huntsmans

Sitting here peacefully eating my breakky, look up above the kitchen cupboards, and there's eight eyes staring down at me! I don't mind them, but i sure as hell don't love them either. i always trap them under a glass and slide the paper under it and put them in a gummy outside, but this girl is going to stay, got to go to work, wonder where she will appear tonight, Freaky!

once, we sprayed the bugger and it crunched up like it's dead... we turned around to grab paper to pick it up, when we turned around it was gone (this was in the bedroom).

another time, when wifey and i finished the shower she grabbed the towel the bugger fell out of the towel on her shoulder (she didn't notice at first, but my terrified face expression gave it away). There was nowhere to run...

another time we came home and hundreds of baby huntsman were all over our ceiling

if you spray the buggers with a hair spray, it immobilises them - they get really slow and they can't run fast any more. Gives you time to take them out or whatever...

They're big in Queensland.

Huntsmen are fairly prolific around here - I personally like them although I used to dislike them with a passion. I started to appreciate them after going to a bbq about 15 years ago at a mate's place. We were standing around a (vertical) 44 gallon drum fire. One of the guys dropped a few logs in it and we watched about 6 huntsmen crawl out from under the bark to sit on top of the top log (the guy that carried the logs about 50m went a bit white). All but one of the huntsmen perished pretty quickly, but one kept running to the edge of the log (the log was sitting with a cut edge facing up & level with the flames). We watched with morbid fascination thinking that it would drop off the edge of the log soon, but after it circumnavigated the log a few times, it walked to an edge and jumped through the flames! The little champion cleared the edge of the drum and landed safely on the grass. I was about to pick it up and walk it to the nearest tree as a reward for it's brave effort...but unfortunately the guy closest beat me to it & stomped on it - the rest of us gave him a fair spray and it nearly ended up in a punch-up. Since then, I don't have any fear of them and have no problem in picking them up. I don't like them in the house though - the wife & kids make too much fuss if they see one.

An apprentice that used to work for me was also arachnophobe. One of the guys at work thought it was funny that he hated spiders so walked up to him with a live one on a stick once. He ran out and got into his car and locked the doors for about 30mins and wouldn't get out until we promised him that there weren't any spiders in the shed.

^^^ After that, I thought I'd get the other guy back (who didn't like spiders either) & have some fun, so found an old dried huntsman shell and just as he was walking past me I flicked it at him...he jumped and dropped a $500 benchtop...it snapped in half when it hit the floor and took 2 days to get in another sheet of laminate. The customer was p!ssed about the delay and I was out of pocket for the replacement.

On real hot summer days in my old workshop, huntsmen & other spiders would drop from the roof and land just about anywhere - always seemed to be just as I was concentrating when one of the buggers would land on my workbench right under my nose.

I don't mind em, but they drink out of the side of your mouth/ eyeballs when your asleep.

Wife alerted me one day that I had a companion in the lounge while watching TV. I am not a real fan, but when wife insisted I spray it, with ol fly spray, I thought ,nar I can brave it and flick it out the side door.
Got the plastic dust shovel, slid door open then with a hoik, flicked him out the door. Was standing there with the shovel held above my head gawking outside ,asking wife "where did the bugger go"? No answer, turned back and looked at her, she was curled up on a chair in stitches, pointing to the shovel, couldnt talk from laughing. Smart arse spider had hung on when I did the hoik bit Near on needed to clean my daks
Safe to say, said shovel is now in orbit

There's always a couple of big fellas around our house. They've got to be the most harmless thing around. Always run away, don't make any webs. I just leave them alone in the hope they might keep the cockroaches at bay.

Got in the shower once. Didn't realise there were about 200 baby huntsman on the bathroom roof. The steam of the shower made them panic, and suddenly they are all dropping down toward the floor on a fine thread of web, like infantry dropping out of a chopper in Vietnam. Looked hilarious.

i work as a gardener, been bitten by these guys 3 times, always when you're picking up a pile of sticks or leaves and crush them. a bee or wasp sting is a lot worse. i reckon the bite is much the same as getting spiked by a rose bush or bouganvillia. it hurts but not too bad. i like seeing them around the house, they are timid and never bite if you let them walk onto your hand, only if they feel threatened or if they have babies with them. poke them with a stick and the poor things back away and won't even bite the stick. try doing that with a funnel web, mouse or wolf spider and they attack. don't kill them, they are almost harmless.

Got bitten by redback last week on elbow. Gee the little bastard gave it to me the more I tried to get it off the harder it bit.

i just thought of something, we have had heaps of little bush flies around lately, must be something in that?

I found one a little bit smaller than my hand sitting on the wall above my bed. I can't stand large spiders and I wouldn't go anywhere near it but my girlfriend at the time picked it up on an envelope and took it outside.. The funny thing is that she was terrified of cockroaches but she was happy to handle a large spider. Phobias are strange..