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One of the most feared spiders in North America is the subject a new study that aims to predict its distribution and how that distribution may be affected by climate changes.
This spider is nasty. I got bit by one two summers ago and man did I ever get sick! First the bite....pain in toe and then burning searing hot pain shot all the way up my leg. Within one day, that toe with the bite on it, bubbled up and inflamed, so painful I couldn't walk on that foot. Hubs lanced the bubble and tried as best he could to clean out the bite. Three days after the bite, found me in a doctor's office feeling as though I were dying, and in sitting there waiting, keeled over with acute chest pains.
Scared? OMG! Terrified!
I was rushed to the emergency section and IV's were started and I was given Nitroglycerin, which gave me a whopper of a headache! An ambulance was called and I was rushed to a hospital. No one at the doctor's office would believe me that I was bit by a brown recluse spider.
And in the ER at the hospital, the docs refused to believe me as well. Why? We are supposedly too far north for the brown recluse spider to be. These docs were insisting that I had stepped on a piece of glass and wanted to admit me for a cardiac workup. I refused and was so hopping mad that I took my IV out and was about to walk out when one of the residents took pity on me, and gave me a script for an antibiotic to take for the bite.
What a nightmare! They hide and are fast. I had flip flops on so my feet were exposed. Do I still wear flip flops? Yep! Am I a bit scared when I walk through my grass bare foot. Yep. But, ya can't let fear rule your life, and darn it, I like to go barefoot and I like to wear flip flops.
Just telling this story because these spiders are seriously nasty!
oops sorry! I have to add that this was either a brown recluse spider or a Wolf Spider. Seeing as how I did not actually see the spider, we deduced it was either or. Either way, either spider is nasty and now I make sure I wear leather gardening gloves while in my gardens!
Last edited by Garden of Eden; 04-29-2011 at 01:25 PM..
If you live in Western NY you were not bitten by a brown recluse. I'm an entomologist and worked for many years in California, where people were always claiming they saw or were bitten by brown recluses, which don't occur, there either. There is a related spider in parts of southeastern CA and Arizona but it doesn't cause the necrosis at the bite site like the brown recluse of the Ozarks and nearby southern and Plains areas.
Here is an article by the University of Kentucky with a map showing the range of the brown recluse:
I don't know if climate change is affecting the range of this spider, but it seems to have definitely increased the range of a number of mosquito species in the US, some of which carry dengue fever, which is a tropical disease that wasn't found in the US until the mosquitoes that carry it spread north. The same has happened in parts of Europe where several zoonotic diseases (diseases of animals that can spread to humans) that used to only occur in northern Africa are now found in the Mediterranean parts of Europe.
Thank you, ukiyo-e for clearing up the mystery. The only other spider that we figured that had bitten me was the Wolf spider. And that makes more sense because my husband had brought lumber in for the building of our barn, and one of the things Wolf Spiders love to do is hide in wood.
Thank you, ukiyo-e for clearing up the mystery. The only other spider that we figured that had bitten me was the Wolf spider. And that makes more sense because my husband had brought lumber in for the building of our barn, and one of the things Wolf Spiders love to do is hide in wood.
Well, all spiders are venomous...so you can have reactions to many of them, but most of them don't have potent enough venom to really bother humans. We're a lot bigger than their usual prey.
I did run into a brown recluse many years ago when I was an entomology student. I was driving across country and stopped to spend the night with some friends in NW Arkansas. I left my car windows down and the next morning when I flipped my sun visor down, one was hiding behind it. Fortunately, I don't freak out about spiders, but you can bet I stepped on that sucker ASAP!
Well, all spiders are venomous...so you can have reactions to many of them, but most of them don't have potent enough venom to really bother humans. We're a lot bigger than their usual prey.
I did run into a brown recluse many years ago when I was an entomology student. I was driving across country and stopped to spend the night with some friends in NW Arkansas. I left my car windows down and the next morning when I flipped my sun visor down, one was hiding behind it. Fortunately, I don't freak out about spiders, but you can bet I stepped on that sucker ASAP!
I see them all the time in the house, both dead and alive. Have nearly given up trying to exterminate them. I put the glue traps out and spot spray whenever I find a web in the house with an eggsac. They are just a fact of life in the midwest.
Well, all spiders are venomous...so you can have reactions to many of them, but most of them don't have potent enough venom to really bother humans. We're a lot bigger than their usual prey.
I did run into a brown recluse many years ago when I was an entomology student. I was driving across country and stopped to spend the night with some friends in NW Arkansas. I left my car windows down and the next morning when I flipped my sun visor down, one was hiding behind it. Fortunately, I don't freak out about spiders, but you can bet I stepped on that sucker ASAP!
Well, from the experience I had, I am a wee bit nervous around spiders now. Who would have thought a tiny spider could hurt so bad?
I again thank you for helping clearing up the mystery. Due to the warming of the environment, I have seen mighty strange insects in my gardens, and spiders? Bees? They seem to be getting larger! I'm grateful I live where I do, because I have seen spiders in Florida that are straight out of a horror movie!
I see them all the time in the house, both dead and alive. Have nearly given up trying to exterminate them. I put the glue traps out and spot spray whenever I find a web in the house with an eggsac. They are just a fact of life in the midwest.
I don't think this is a "gardening" issue. Recluse spiders are found mainly inside buildings, and that would be even more particularly true in cooler climates.
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I'm grateful I live where I do, because I have seen spiders in Florida that are straight out of a horror movie! 
