Cellar Spider |
A spider is an araneae, an order of arachnid. There are many thousand different kinds of spiders. All spiders have eight legs. Most spiders have eight eyes but some have fewer than eight. They don't have ears, they feel the sound vibrations with tiny hairs on their legs. Their bodies have two parts, the head and the abdomen. The abdomen is plump. Spider blood is light blue. Blood fills up all the empty space in the spider's body, it helps to keep the legs stiff so the spider can walk. Spiders breathe, too. As spiders grow, they molt. That means they shed their old skin and grow a new one. They molt many times before they become adults. Many spiders live for only one year but some, like tarantulas can live much longer. Spiders come in different sizes. Some are fuzzy and others are smooth, and they come in many different colors. Spiders live in many different kinds of places, water, gardens, houses, and the ground. They live where it is hot and where it is cold. They live where it is wet and where it is dry. Some are poisonous and others are not. They all eat insects and some other animals.
The brown recluse spider is brown and smooth with a violin-shaped pattern on its back. These spiders are very poisonous, aggressive, and they enjoy hiding in soft places like the arms and legs of clothing, bedding, or pillows more than any other spider.
If the spider is black with a red hourglass-shaped pattern on its underbelly. If it is, then it is almost certainly a Black Widow. These spiders have extremely poisonous venom, and commonly hang upside down from their rough, messy webs. The black widow spider produces a protein venom that affects the victim's nervous system. The first symptom is acute pain at the site of the bite, although there may only be a minimal local reaction. Symptoms usually start within 20 minutes to one hour after the bite.