Can you Identify this Spider?

This is not a prank post, I need to know what kind of spider this is.



I live in a basement suite in East Van* and as such, am used to finding all sorts of spiders and insects around the house. 

About once a year, we get The Big Spider aka, the biggest spider sighting of the year until next year rolls around.

Unfortunately, The Big Spider almost always happens to or is spotted by me.

A few years ago it was a giant house spider IN THE FREAKING SHOWER with me one day.  I have also seen a dead mouse spider (thanks to the hunting efforts of my Maine Coon, Liberty Bell), though normally we are a 'catch and release' household. We also get a regular assortment of wolf spiders.



The Big Spider of 2020 made its appearance a couple weeks ago (mid-May), pictured here. 

I was sitting on the couch, enjoying watching Unorthodox, with my cat in my lap. I spotted a bit of movement out of the corner of my eye on the armrest of the couch and spotted THIS bad boy (although, judging my the spinnerets, she was DEF a lady spider) creeping around out of the corner of my eye. I screamed quietly, for I was home alone and didn't want to scare her away. I shoved the cat out of my lap (THANKS FOR NOTHING, LB!) sprinted to the kitchen to grab a glass, and very thankfully, she had not disappeared, and after much more quiet screaming I caught her.

I kept her so that my wife could SEE when she got home--I wanted her to believe me about the SIZE of the spider, and so she could take it outside. 

I then proceeded to text these pics to almost everyone I know because that's what adults do, right?



I have found that a good way to deal with arachnophobia over the years is to identify the type of spider (sort of like putting a name to a face).  For this spider though, I had a tough time/couldn't really find anything conclusive, and so she's been on my mind A LOT. Maybe I just had hysterical blindness while reading about spider varieties online and missed the answer staring me in the face.

If you can identify what type of spider this is, please for the love of God let me know.

As it is not super clear in the pictures, here are some details about her:
  • 3 centimetres long from tips of front legs to tips of back legs
  • Eyes not visible at a quick glance/not prominently featured
  • Very visible spinnerets
  • Thick abdomen 
  • Was not black or shiny, was brownish-purple
  • Abdomen appeared to have very fine, white hairs covering it (looked like smooth/silky hairs, not spiky)
  • She was not very fast moving. Even when I caught her, she was still just creeping slowly around
  • She did NOT rear up or any other unusual behaviour once caught, she was pretty chill
  • Legs were almost translucent 
I have included a diagram of a spider in case you are unfamiliar with a spider abdomen and spinnerets (I had to look it up, too!)




*East Vancouver is the traditional, ancestral and unceded territory of the Coast Salish peoples–Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), Stó:lō and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) Nations.

Popular posts from this blog

9 Reasons Why Zack on Gilmore Girls is the Worst

Image
Of all the men in the Gilmore Girls world, I think Zack was the worst. Here's nine reasons why. I'm currently re-watching Gilmore girls for the umpteenth time, and once more I find myself loathing Zack in particular. Normally we all get caught up in Luke vs. Christopher, Dean vs. Jess vs. Logan, etc, but I think these debates distract viewers from realizing that Zack is the worst Significant Other of all the women in the show. I think the actor Todd Lowe does a great job portraying Zack, so my critique is def not his performance , my issue is the  character of Zack   who is sooo contemptible. In a way, Lowe's performance of Zack is all the more remarkable - when it comes to the Bad Men of Gilmore Girls, Zack rarely tops the list. I think it's because his many flaws are so *shrug* boys will be boys. As viewers I think we're meant to be distracted by the explosive incidents related to Logan's elitism, Mitchum's tyranny, Dean's cheating, Marty's obvio...
Read more

Omg She's Racist: A Closer Look at L.M. Montgomery's Work & Life

Image
They say to be critical of the media you love. I put this to the test with my undying love for L.M. Montgomery. In the past five-ish years, I have read and re-read many, many books by beloved Canadian author L.M. Montgomery (aka the woman who wrote the Anne of Green Gables series) including: Anne of Windy Poplars*  Anne’s House of Dreams*  Emily of New Moon  Emily Climbs Emily’s Quest  The Complete Journals of L.M. Montgomery 1889-1900 A Tangled Web  Pat of Silver Bush  Mistress Pat   Jane of Lantern Hill  Kilmeny of the Orchard  The Blue Castle I read/re-read the first three Anne books as a teen*. There are many things about Montgomery's (1874-1942) work that are significant and ground-breaking considering the era they were written in. Not to mention Montgomery herself being such a highly-successful author worldwide given she was both a woman and Canadian! Her work is unique and noteworthy for the followin...
Read more

Best of Helen Oyeyemi's "Peaces"

Image
Here is a selection of memorable quotes from Peaces by Helen Oyeyemi. Painting above: The Lovers by Leonora Carrington (c.1987) You run the romantic gauntlet for decades without knowing who exactly it is you're giving and taking such a battering in order to reach. You run the gauntlet without knowing whether the person whose favour you seek will even be there once you somehow put that path strewn with sensory confetti and emotional gore behind you. And then, by some stroke of fortune the gauntlet concludes, the person does exist after all, and you become that perpetually astonished lover from so many of the songs you used to find endlessly disingenuous. p.5 If you stuck out your tongue it would dance there, right at the top: the fizz of conditionality. p.7 I'm sure almost no one deludes themselves that all their ancestors were decent. Pick a vein, any vein: mud mixed with lightning that flows through, an unruly fusion of bad blood and good. p.16 And then there's the...
Read more