Joined
·
413 Posts
I've seen male Black Widows with the hourglass. I know they were males b/c they were brown and on a female's web with her. The males look "flattened" to me; the females are always much plumper.
I used to find and kill Black Widows on a regular basis when we lived near Gainesville. They like dark places, and I'd find them turning over the rocks bordering the garden surrounding the house.
Once a friend and I had spent the afternoon riding my horse. We were back at the barn and my friend was about to dismount when I saw a VERY large black widow crawling across my horse's haunch, with my friend still in the saddle! I immediately knocked it off and stomped on it, but I was really freaked out, terrified that she'd bitten my mare! My dad pointed out that if the spider had bitten my horse, we'd definitely have been bucked off. Turns out that the spider had built her web underneath the seat of the saddle; it was a miracle that none of us were bitten, especially when I was tacking up. There was also a really large egg sack in the web that I also made sure I completely destroyed. UGHHHHHHH
I used to find and kill Black Widows on a regular basis when we lived near Gainesville. They like dark places, and I'd find them turning over the rocks bordering the garden surrounding the house.
Once a friend and I had spent the afternoon riding my horse. We were back at the barn and my friend was about to dismount when I saw a VERY large black widow crawling across my horse's haunch, with my friend still in the saddle! I immediately knocked it off and stomped on it, but I was really freaked out, terrified that she'd bitten my mare! My dad pointed out that if the spider had bitten my horse, we'd definitely have been bucked off. Turns out that the spider had built her web underneath the seat of the saddle; it was a miracle that none of us were bitten, especially when I was tacking up. There was also a really large egg sack in the web that I also made sure I completely destroyed. UGHHHHHHH
