I found a large spider on my back deck last night. Bigger than any I have ever seen in the northeast. In the fall here most spiders are at the biggest, having had all summer to grow to full maturity. There are plenty of smaller spiders around here, especially jumping spiders, but not an abundance of larger species that regularly show themselves.
I thought there were plenty of spiders in Florida. When I lived there for a few years and was working in the pine forests, I would regularly find orb weaving spiders all over the place. There was also lots of ground spiders running around. The worst was walking along and getting a hair net – a big round spider web wrapped around your head as you walked through it. Later in the year there was usually a big spider in the middle of it along with a nice sticky bulls eye in the center.
Australia though took the cake. I have never seen an abundance of spiders like I have there. It put Florida to shame.
I was glad to see the spider I did last night. I enjoyed gazing upon it and the memories of my past travels.
photo courtesy MrClean – Creative Commons license