I'm NEVER going to Australia!!!

[starbkjrus]

Get thee to the bookstore and pick up a copy of "In A Sunburned Country" by Bill Bryson. Bryson also wrote "A Walk In The Woods". Both are very funny...not in a ROTFLMA way but in a more subtle and literate way.

"Sunburned" is a chronicle of his travels in Australia. In "Woods" he hikes the Appalachian Trail and the comic hook is the ever present possibility that he's going to encounter a bear. In "Sunburned" he's constantly worrying about encountering one of the seemingly hundreds of venomous critters that inhabit the Land Down Under.

You'll love it.

Best

AA

Not to hijack the thread but Bill Bryson's "Notes from a Small Island" is my favorite of his. It's a humor travelogue writen while he walks from one end of Great Britain to the other. (Dover to John 'o Groats) Get it

Back on topic: I subscribe to a live and let live philosophy but when a spider is big enough to hunt me down I think I'll avoid the area.

I assume I wouldn't run into one of these in downtown Sydney.

[ccga3359]

It's funny, of all the Aussies I know they are more afraid of the animals we have here in North America. A good friend just recently moved from Perth and has never seen a shark, crocodile, or had too much exposure to the snakes or spiders, but now lives in a neighborhood in BC where bears in the yard are really common, we have had cougars (not just the ones in leopard print either) and a wolverine in the area. We have coyotes outside all the time.

Yup we have the old leopard print cougars here in Ontario. They not dangerous though, nary a kilt check... Still! They all seem attracted to McMurdo.

[kiltimabar]

A while back a cable channel had an hour's program entirely devoted to poisonous Australian spiders, some of them quite large, and many of them to be found in NSW, if not Sydney itself.

[Mair of the Tribe of Mar]

This thread is horrible, I will be having nightmares for the rest of the week, spiders are definately the closest thing to the burning circles of hades that we have on earth!

Thank you very much for pushing up the squeem factor!!

[Retro Red]

Golden Orb spiders are indeed very impressive because the female grows large, by spider standards. Different varieties are found around the world, including the U.S.A. I remember coming across one in Arkansas. They're a non-aggressive spider; they'll avoid humans, if possible. I try to avoid killing spiders around my home (unless it's a fairly poisonous one like Black Widows or Brown Recluse) because they're so effective at killing other insects - great natural pest control! You might say I enjoy hosting multiple "web"sites at my house.

Here's a nice article that does a good job of presenting the benign nature of the Golden Orb.
http://calamvalecreek.awardspace.com/minti.html

Hey, AL-58, thanks for sharing the pic of the St. Andrews Cross spider. I'd never heard of that one - very cool!

.

[AL-58]

I can understand that entirely. I've fielded lots of travel questions about OZ because I do travel and camp quite a bit. Just about every American that's ever asked me about coming here asks about the spiders and snakes. I think it's because too many shows/documentaries promote that fact, while we might have these bitey things, you don't encounter them very often. And we do not have any land based predators, animals that will go after you to eat you. A 200kg lump of fur that wants to kill me is a much scarier concept to me compared to a spider that will bite if I tread on him or a snake that will bite if I'm stupid enough to disturb him (walk noisily in the bush and you generally won't see snakes cause they get out of your way).

All that said, I've had snakes in my front yard (cause I live adjacent to 5000 acres of bushland). I do not take my dogs walking out there in the summer(snakes become more active in the warmer months) as they are Terriers and at least one of them is likely to hunt snakes and get bit. Seen a few crocs in 2002 in the Territory, boy do they move fast, you wouldn't stand a chance of outrunning one.

I'd rather have the snakes than the bears I think.

Al

It's funny, of all the Aussies I know they are more afraid of the animals we have here in North America. A good friend just recently moved from Perth and has never seen a shark, crocodile, or had too much exposure to the snakes or spiders, but now lives in a neighborhood in BC where bears in the yard are really common, we have had cougars (not just the ones in leopard print either) and a wolverine in the area. We have coyotes outside all the time.

I'm still going one of these days as I hear the country is beautiful and based on the Aussie I have meet while traveling and while visiting the local "Australian province of Whistler, B.C." they are a fantastic bunch of people too.

[Big Homestead]

If spiders eating birds turn you off, you shouldn't go. On that note,...

I wonder if spiders in Aussialand have seen pics of you eating chicken and said,.." I'm never going to the States, look at them eat that thing." lol.

Great post mate.

[GDub]

I like spiders. They actually make our lives more pleasant doing what they do (eating the more annoying insects by the billions of tons every year), but that one is a BEAST! Damn, my 2" garden spiders are dwarfs in comparison. Tarantulas are like cats so they're no big deal, but the bird eater is impressive. Hell, I would go to Australia just to see one of those big boys!

[davedove]

we have had cougars (not just the ones in leopard print either)

Yup we have the old leopard print cougars here in Ontario. They not dangerous though, nary a kilt check... Still! They all seem attracted to McMurdo.

Ay, yes, the North American leopard-spotted cougar is widespread. Fortunately, they tend to only prey on young males, so I no longer have much to worry about.

[Red_Raven]

We Have banded orb spiders here but they only get about 2-3" across, not bird eating size. one from our friends garden