4 ms·
I notice this whenever I try to pick up a spider and bring it outside the house. They want to jump off my hand as quickly as possible, and descend to the ground
by chihuahua 5y ago
I notice this whenever I try to pick up a spider and bring it outside the house. They want to jump off my hand as quickly as possible, and descend to the ground on a strand of silk. They have no interest in biting etc.
So the best way to bring them outside is to put a plastic cup over the spider, then carefully slide a postcard underneath the cup, and then release it outside.
- throwanem 5y agoI avoid that because it risks harming the spider - the cup/card interface is basically one giant moving pinch point, and the force required to cause traumatic amputation is insignificant by human standards. But they can only secrete silk so quickly, which makes the escape thread itself very serviceable as a means of carrying them to safety - just raise your hand gradually as they extend the thread, so they don't touch down until you want them to. It depends on the spider, too. Orb weavers are reliably fearful, which makes sense given how little they can perceive away from a web, but I've had the occasional salticid climb up to perch on my knuckles with no sign of dismay, and wait to hop off until I bring my hand close to a suitable surface.
- stjohnswarts 5y agoSorry dude, I'm giving them a chance with the cup and junk mail method. I'm not carrying one by the "silk". Nature is ruthless and I'm giving them a fighting chance :)
- throwanem 5y agoThe hell of it is, I have to respect this perspective at least a tiny bit, however unwillingly, because at least you apparently don't default to wholesale murder the way people typically do. Congratulations on clearing the lowest possible bar, I guess? But you're talking to someone who once spent half an hour at the kitchen table carefully disentangling a mud dauber who'd stumbled into a blob of cat fur and couldn't free herself on her own, and then gave her a drop of sugar water and hand-carried her outside. That's my default when it comes to these small, smart animals who face danger from us through no fault of their own, and I really don't know what more can be fairly expected of me here.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- throwaway675309 5y agoFor the record, the term murder is used specifically to refer to human on human killing and doesn't really apply to this situation.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- chihuahua 5y agoI use a clear plastic cup, so I can make sure all the spider's legs are out of harm's way before I slide the postcard underneath.