Funnel -web spiders

[EK2]

Might I add that it is Hadronyche Infensa that is the most dangerous. Formidabilis is *only* as potentially dangerous as Atrax Robustus, though there are many many undescribed species out there currently it is Infensa that poses the biggest threat, strangely though, once antivenin is administered the symptoms clear up in under an hour in most cases.

End result can be horrible death in convulsive throes by the time the sitcom on TV finishes, any way you slice it. They will all take your head off as soon as look at you. (Old Jungle saying)

 

[EK2]

I agree EK2--Atrax / Hadronyche really aren't suitable for the "pet" hobby as they are simply too venomous, unless we could somehow regulate their distribution to experts only. But I would LOVE to see some Macrothele and / or Missulena get into the US hobby. Venomous still, but not at the level of the Aussie f-webs. We seriously need some more non-theraphosid mygales in the US hobby that aren't trapdoors.

One possible approach (emphasis on possible), would to be have a few experts with the resources keep some on a limited basis. They could work on producing a stock of antivenene for local distribution. Once the backup is in place, the blokes who have been maintaining them could assess whether proceeding is advisable, and under what parameters. As pointed out above, there are a number of unidentified species, would be interesting to get some first hand research from US experts.

 

[Stefan2209]

Hi there,

i´m sorry but this thread is mostly just a very poor statement how less is known about evaluation of "dangerousness" and "toxicity" at all.

Next to that single members statements are just contradictionary.

Does just one single guy out of you folks have first hand experience with keeping Atrax / Haydronyche?
By the way, the thread was about "funnel webs", why do most of you break this term just down to the two "hot" genera?

Even if he´d want to keep one of those, chances are next to nil to get hold of them if he´s not directly located in Australia.

Furthermore by the way, "venomous" as a term is used if you have consumed something venomous, like Fugu that hasn´t been treaten properly. If talking about animals that inject venom, we´re talking about toxic here.

I´m quite interested to learn about all the deaths caused by Phoneutria in whole South-America, though, seems like i have missed some studies? About real thread potential in regard of those: i have been in a corner of Peru where 3 different species of Phoneutria are around: P. boliviensis, P. fera and P. reidyi. Just no one could remember as much as one single accident with these spiders.
P. boliviensis could be collected with bare hands --> real killers...

I suggest, you all have a good read:

http://www.washington.edu/burkemuseum/spidermyth/myths/tarantula.html#deadly

and even more:

http://www.washington.edu/burkemuseum/spidermyth/myths/downunder.html

A real pity to read such unbased stuff in a board where people are around that dubb themselfes "being interested in spiders".

Greetings,

Stefan

 

[EK2]

The others didnt assume the question was about A + H. Apologies for focussing too much on the 2 species. Forwarded a opinion on the subject, emphasizing it was non-expert, and that others will have different POV's. Atrax and Hadronyche are not deadly, toxic, nor dangerous to humans? That is certainly a relief. Cannot confirm much RE the Wanderer, if it is as harmless as you imply, will take your word for it. Familiar with the stats RE Atrax and Hadronyche. Stats are wonderful things. Since the antivenene became available, there has indeed been no deaths. As pointed out by another, the antiv is quite effective, and can prevent death, and reduce serious effects short of death. Much is missing in the stats. Not figures exactly, but other factors. Aus FW's are fairly widespread, but in a very narrow zone, and amongst a tiny national population. Most everybody knows, and knows what to do. All the recent cases, known of have successfully employed the system very swiftly, which is part of the program. Should the unfortunate occur, it is likely that hospitalization and treatment will be the case before fatality. It is indeed comforting, but should one not get the treatment, for a serious envenomation, it is doubtful the victim would share such an optimistic view.
No, not all bites are fatal. There are reasons that are species specific for this, as well are random factors. They certainly are not the overwhelming threat they used to be, but one would hope to forgive the ingrained fear, even paranoia, that comes from past history and experience, with locals. There is a tendency to, amongst many, to maintain a pessimistic view of encounters. Call it self-preservation perhaps. These stats really do need to be examined in context. Pre antivenene, and post anti venene. There is little hard data prior to the 1970's, on these things. Once the antivenene is available, and the studies by stats, on envenomation, begins, it can be easy to draw a much more optimistic picture on the A and to a lesser degree the H, FW. But a couple of generations of the population would disagree to a large extent. The academics include the view that some bites might be (or are) wrongly attributed to the FW. But in the past, due to demographics and technical backwardness inherent in the country, there are cases that are simply not included. The fully accredited killer Atrax, is the one in closest proximity to a major urban area. The Had limited to quite sparsely populated regions until well after WW2. Even as late as the 1970's in many cases. This did serve to amplify the danger of the Atrax, and minimise the Hadronyche, to a fair degree, even though the toxicity of some of Had's is less than the Atrax. If the knowledge and experience of locals, and in general, is far too undocumented to be taken seriously, then dismiss it if it suits. Overall hard stats of fatal, and serious envenomations are quite right though, and they are certainly of value. Due to the nature of the Atrax and Hadronyche strike, venom injection can be often low, and chances of a non fatal bite are pretty good. But when considering this FW, it has always been the practice to consider worst case, rather than best case. For obvious reasons. But as mentioned, it is only an opinion, and not one of an expert. We are still learning about these spiders, and there are certainly others with more experience than me, who can weigh in. In the meanttime, please forgive the tendency to take the older generation's views as of value. Also expressions meant to be somewhat tongue in cheek.

 

[Stefan2209]

The others didnt assume the question was about A + H. Apologies for focussing too much on the 2 species. Forwarded a opinion on the subject, emphasizing it was non-expert, and that others will have different POV's. Atrax and Hadronyche are not deadly, toxic, nor dangerous to humans? That is certainly a relief. Cannot confirm much RE the Wanderer, if it is as harmless as you imply, will take your word for it. Familiar with the stats RE Atrax and Hadronyche. Stats are wonderful things. Since the antivenene became available, there has indeed been no deaths. As pointed out by another, the antiv is quite effective, and can prevent death, and reduce serious effects short of death. Much is missing in the stats. Not figures exactly, but other factors. Aus FW's are fairly widespread, but in a very narrow zone, and amongst a tiny national population. Most everybody knows, and knows what to do. All the recent cases, known of have successfully employed the system very swiftly, which is part of the program. Should the unfortunate occur, it is likely that hospitalization and treatment will be the case before fatality. It is indeed comforting, but should one not get the treatment, for a serious envenomation, it is doubtful the victim would share such an optimistic view.
No, not all bites are fatal. There are reasons that are species specific for this, as well are random factors. They certainly are not the overwhelming threat they used to be, but one would hope to forgive the ingrained fear, even paranoia, that comes from past history and experience, with locals. There is a tendency to, amongst many, to maintain a pessimistic view of encounters. Call it self-preservation perhaps. These stats really do need to be examined in context. Pre antivenene, and post anti venene. There is little hard data prior to the 1970's, on these things. Once the antivenene is available, and the studies by stats, on envenomation, begins, it can be easy to draw a much more optimistic picture on the A and to a lesser degree the H, FW. But a couple of generations of the population would disagree to a large extent. The academics include the view that some bites might be (or are) wrongly attributed to the FW. But in the past, due to demographics and technical backwardness inherent in the country, there are cases that are simply not included. The fully accredited killer Atrax, is the one in closest proximity to a major urban area. The Had limited to quite sparsely populated regions until well after WW2. Even as late as the 1970's in many cases. This did serve to amplify the danger of the Atrax, and minimise the Hadronyche, to a fair degree, even though the toxicity of some of Had's is less than the Atrax. If the knowledge and experience of locals, and in general, is far too undocumented to be taken seriously, then dismiss it if it suits. Overall hard stats of fatal, and serious envenomations are quite right though, and they are certainly of value. Due to the nature of the Atrax and Hadronyche strike, venom injection can be often low, and chances of a non fatal bite are pretty good. But when considering this FW, it has always been the practice to consider worst case, rather than best case. For obvious reasons. But as mentioned, it is only an opinion, and not one of an expert. We are still learning about these spiders, and there are certainly others with more experience than me, who can weigh in. In the meanttime, please forgive the tendency to take the older generation's views as of value. Also expressions meant to be somewhat tongue in cheek.

Hi there,

don´t mind, „the others“ didn't do much better, so I won´t take this for an excuse.

Being no expert? Me neither. It doens´t take an expert, all it does is some background knowledge or at least the ability and motivation to look up all the information laying around. I witness one really sad story since long: any time there´s just the slightest chance to get the topic into “signidicant toxic” spiders, people come up, claiming “I'm no expert” and telling buckets full of wrong tell-tale stories. Why is that?

I haven´t implied with any single word that any member of the genera Atrax / Hadronyche would be “harmless”. What I indeed said is just that they´re half as “dangerous” as some people here announce and to give a personal account I added personal experience with wild living specimen of Phoneutria boliviensis here.
Neither do I encourage other people to even attempt something like this, nor would I myself do this with adult P. nigriventer females.

All you guys talk about “dangerousness”, but lack the understanding that you´re indeed talking about “toxicity” in a chemical meaning: you´re talking about just the chemical activity of toxins of different species, genera and even families.
This has NOTHING to do with a level of danger.

No one here, me included, is able to come up with a danger evaluation of the person who started the thread, as there are just many factors that needed to be included in such an analysis that we all just can´t know. Even if we could, we´d have to do this for any single species of funnel web spider, as the thread starter didn't specify which species he wants to keep.

>It is indeed comforting, but should one not get the treatment, for a serious >envenomation, it is doubtful the victim would share >such an optimistic view.

I don't know, if I'm gonna believe in this or not…
Anyway, doesn´t play any role, as the thread was about the captive care, wasn´t it? I can come up with something similar: if I put my .45 ACP Glock 30 to my temple and pull the trigger while the gun is cocked and loaded I have a quite high chance to be dead the very same second…
Do you hear the shot?

>They certainly are not the overwhelming threat they used to be

???
Please show us scientifical proof of the time where those spiders used to be an “overwhelming threat”, sounds like they have killed half Australia or something… May this indeed be the reason there are areas in that continent where next to no humans live? All eradicated by a poor spider…

Don't mind clear statements, I'm definitely enjoying this.

If you want knowledge from indigenous people taken into consideration, take a peek into South-America: there are several examples around, one of them even experienced by one member who´s participating in this thread.
To give just personal or documented accounts here:

Trechona venosa is since long dubbed to be “lethal”. If you track this back you´ll finally come to Büchler in the 1930´s, who got that bull told by indios.
There's to date not one documented case I'd be aware of and I check for updates quite regularly. T. venosa belongs to the family of Dipluridae, I'm keeping Diplurids and I have oberserved them in the wild. I even tapped with the finger into their webs: what a let down, they just ran away. Major dangerous…

Dendryphantes noxiosus is another case, shall be lethal. Evidence, bite cases? Nothing.

A member of the genus Mastophora shall be lethal, too. Evidence, bite cases? Nothing.

Tell tale stories of people who don't know anything or who aren´t able to recognize what they had been dealing with.

Take Lycosa tarantula from Europe for just another example, for quite some time people believed this species to be very toxic, many accidents had occurred.
In fact the real culprit which had caused all that indeed existing intoxications had been Latrodectus tredecimguttata…
Well, at least I have to admit these two species resemble each other like one egg the other, oh dear.

From personal experience I can tell that a guy in the Peruvian amazon area who was “grown up in the woods” tried to make me believe Ancylometes rufus would be lethal. Sure….

Indigenous people may often enough know best about the fauna in their direct vicinity, in other cases they just don't know anything, but are not reluctant to tell their stories.

Under one last, finishing aspect:

Even if the thread starter wanted to keep one of the Hadronyche or Atrax, how dangerous would that be, if he has just some basic experience with keeping other spiders and is given PROPER advise?
Not much. The spiders just can´t climb smooth surfaces. Advise should primarily concentrate on this fact and the proper enclosure set up, if that is accomplished, one would really have to go through efforts to catch a bite.

Stay safe.

Greetings,

Stefan

 

[cacoseraph]

Furthermore by the way, "venomous" as a term is used if you have consumed something venomous, like Fugu that hasn´t been treaten properly. If talking about animals that inject venom, we´re talking about toxic here.

one little point. in US english typically "venom" is something that is injected and "poison" is something that is comsumed or absorbed... but in the literature those two words are used all but interchangeably. in common parlance both venom and poison are toxic, which means a substance inimical to life processes, regardless of vector

 

[EK2]

"danger" factor would not be limited to "toxicity". If they are no real threat or danger to you, do it. As I said, some are adamant that they are reasonable to handle, with care. Others not. You seem to want academic evaluation that cannot be provided. Even with the post 1970's data, applying a standard that demands more than 10% fatality rate (or potential fatality based on application of antivenene) to qualify as "deadly" is philosophical, but. Not sure what you are after. There may be some language interference. Not sure you understand the meaning of threat etc. They will bite. If you receive a serious envenomation you can die. They have a tendency to bite with little or no real provocation. Proximity is sometimes enough. They somewhere between half a dozen to a dozen serious cases a year. Is an individual who wants to keep them certain to be in danger? Potentially, yes. Could he keep them without incident? Possibly. Absence of antivenene is not going to help though. You seem to discount anything forwarded anyway.

 

[Stefan2209]

Hi again,

what i´m after?

Easy: try to get some correct understanding into this. If we are talking about “funnel web spiders” there´s not just Atrax / Hadronyche covered.
In fact, if we exclude Australia, it's highly unlikely to run into one of those in the general “pet trade”.
This is the most important fact to me. I really wonder, why so many people react to the term “funnel web” with reactions like that. Just one more statement to use scientifical names here.

Due to my monthly income, I have indeed the impression I know at least a bit about risk evaluation, I'm working in security business and risk analyses and risk management is often enough part of my every day job.

From personal expierence, if you´re interested in that, i´ve kept several species of Latrodetcus in the past, Loxosceles laeta, two different species of Sicarius and am actually keeping and breeding three different species of Phoneutria.
I do this since more then 10 years, never got tagged and don't plan to change this in the future.

Next to mentioned species I have kept and am actually keeping a whole bunch of other families, genera and species, including Hexathelidae, with Macrothele calpeiana.

I have until now not witnessed one single spider that I, personally, would name a “threat” to human kind in general.
If dumb humans come in contact with something I just want to name the “wrong species” here, dangerous situations can result out of this.
As well to my personal experience as to my professional opinion due to my job, I don't blame such on the spider, but on the humans.

If you know what you´re doing, why not pick up that Phoneutria?

If you´d ask for my advise what YOU should do: stay away, those CAN be dangerous if you don't know what you´re doing.
Simple as this. Everybody is responsible for his own actions.

To make one thing clear: personally, I don't care about Atrax / Hadronyche, be it for their toxicity or their behaviour.
If you´re really into that “think about what will happen if a bite should occur”-thing, without any questions No. 1 would be Sicarius oweni or S. testaceus to me.
Extremely fast acting toxin that will cause massive necrosis and inner-bleedings there´s no known treatment.

Anyway, who´s interested in such rather “philosophical” debates?

Let´s get back to the topic here: keeping of pet funnel webs: Macrotheles or something.

Greetings,

Stefan

 

[Crotalus]

Hi there,

i´m sorry but this thread is mostly just a very poor statement how less is known about evaluation of "dangerousness" and "toxicity" at all.

Next to that single members statements are just contradictionary.

Does just one single guy out of you folks have first hand experience with keeping Atrax / Haydronyche?
By the way, the thread was about "funnel webs", why do most of you break this term just down to the two "hot" genera?

M. calpeiana have allready been suggested.

Even if he´d want to keep one of those, chances are next to nil to get hold of them if he´s not directly located in Australia.

I know atleast two people that keep Hadronyche. Impossible? No its not. Difficult? Yes.

Furthermore by the way, "venomous" as a term is used if you have consumed something venomous, like Fugu that hasn´t been treaten properly. If talking about animals that inject venom, we´re talking about toxic here.

Why bring in fugu here? The toxicity is defining on how potent a toxin are. no one talks about "poisonous" here.
"Venomous" is the correct term for animals that inject venom, for others such as dart frogs etc itds "poisonous". If you believe venomous is wrong to use, you are quite alone. I dont know any scientist in the field of venom that would not use it.

I´m quite interested to learn about all the deaths caused by Phoneutria in whole South-America, though, seems like i have missed some studies? About real thread potential in regard of those: i have been in a corner of Peru where 3 different species of Phoneutria are around: P. boliviensis, P. fera and P. reidyi. Just no one could remember as much as one single accident with these spiders.
P. boliviensis could be collected with bare hands --> real killers...

And this is relavant to the discussion? Ok since you brought it up:
Have you been in Brazil, in the heavily populated areas where most bites occur? Of course, the less people in a area - the less risk that a animal bites a person. Simple math.
Amazon jungle = less people. Sao Paulo = lots of people...
You might not think Phoneutria have killed a single person, but that statement stands for you. I suggest you read a little more on the subject.

I suggest, you all have a good read:

http://www.washington.edu/burkemuseum/spidermyth/myths/tarantula.html#deadly

and even more:

http://www.washington.edu/burkemuseum/spidermyth/myths/downunder.html

A real pity to read such unbased stuff in a board where people are around that dubb themselfes "being interested in spiders".

Greetings,

Stefan

I suggest you read this thread just once more.

 

[Crotalus]

Easy: try to get some correct understanding into this. If we are talking about “funnel web spiders” there´s not just Atrax / Hadronyche covered.

Why not read the thread? Macrothele have been suggested....

In fact, if we exclude Australia, it's highly unlikely to run into one of those in the general “pet trade”.

Pet trade as in pet shops? Yes very unlikely.
Pet trade as in devoted hobbyist? No they are there but in small numbers.

This is the most important fact to me. I really wonder, why so many people react to the term “funnel web” with reactions like that. Just one more statement to use scientifical names here.

If you read the thread from the start you might noticed you are completely up the wall here. Besides, funnel web is just a popuklar term for a certain group of spiders. There is nothing that says it has to be australian genus.

Due to my monthly income, I have indeed the impression I know at least a bit about risk evaluation, I'm working in security business and risk analyses and risk management is often enough part of my every day job.

Ok? This is relevant how?

From personal expierence, if you´re interested in that, i´ve kept several species of Latrodetcus in the past, Loxosceles laeta, two different species of Sicarius and am actually keeping and breeding three different species of Phoneutria.
I do this since more then 10 years, never got tagged and don't plan to change this in the future.

Ok? This is relevant how?

Next to mentioned species I have kept and am actually keeping a whole bunch of other families, genera and species, including Hexathelidae, with Macrothele calpeiana.

Ok? Good for you.

I have until now not witnessed one single spider that I, personally, would name a “threat” to human kind in general.
If dumb humans come in contact with something I just want to name the “wrong species” here, dangerous situations can result out of this.
As well to my personal experience as to my professional opinion due to my job, I don't blame such on the spider, but on the humans.

A spider CAN bite a human. The probability is sometimes low, but still, they do bite.

If you know what you´re doing, why not pick up that Phoneutria?

Why? That a act of severe idiocy

To make one thing clear: personally, I don't care about Atrax / Hadronyche, be it for their toxicity or their behaviour.

Then dont bother try correct others.

If you´re really into that “think about what will happen if a bite should occur”-thing, without any questions No. 1 would be Sicarius oweni or S. testaceus to me.
Extremely fast acting toxin that will cause massive necrosis and inner-bleedings there´s no known treatment.

I look forward to a upcoming article then.
They also have a extremely low venom yield, something that are as important as the venom itself. Strange that you missed that "little" thing...

 

[John Apple]

Macrothele calpieana

I have these [as do a few others ] and I can say as far as behavior they are as unpredictable as all heck. One minute they are placid, one minute very fast and moving and the next they do a nasty threat display. If they have a nice web built they tend to run into the tube. I am told they have a nasty bite and that is what I have passed on. There are pics on another thread on the site
My female is a shed from an adult and the male has been mature for the better part of a month. So when she sheds and builds a nice retreat I will introduce him. I have some others that are real close and so if he passes he passes.

 

[beetleman]

awesome! hope your breeding goes well:clap:

 

[beetleman]

I have these [as do a few others ] and I can say as far as behavior they are as unpredictable as all heck. One minute they are placid, one minute very fast and moving and the next they do a nasty threat display. If they have a nice web built they tend to run into the tube. I am told they have a nasty bite and that is what I have passed on. There are pics on another thread on the site
My female is a shed from an adult and the male has been mature for the better part of a month. So when she sheds and builds a nice retreat I will introduce him. I have some others that are real close and so if he passes he passes.

yup, mine is the same in behavior,she can be very nasty:razz:

 

[Venom]

Even if the thread starter wanted to keep one of the Hadronyche or Atrax, how dangerous would that be, if he has just some basic experience with keeping other spiders and is given PROPER advise?
Not much. The spiders just can´t climb smooth surfaces.

WRONG. It would be EXTREMELY DANGEROUS. Androctonus australis and Leiurus sp. can't climb glass either, and a sting is all but impossible as long as you never enter the cage and never transfer, but we don't advise newbies to keep them, do we? It's a matter of possible consequences--what could happen, if a mistake were to occur? In this case, the bite would be certainly life-threatening, quite possibly fatal. Hadronyche / Atrax are NOT safe spiders, as I believe EK2 has thoroughly established by now. They are utterly intolerant of any disturbance, and readily bite repeatedly. And even the best keepers make mistakes--so much more so the new keepers! You are badly assessing the danger of keeping these bugs.

Advise should primarily concentrate on this fact and the proper enclosure set up,

Sure, let's focus on housing, and forget the fact that a single bite--JUST ONE MISTAKE-- could mean your life.

if that is accomplished, one would really have to go through efforts to catch a bite.

Have you ever seen these things in action? They throw strikes at a puff of air! All you would have to do is let one hand--one finger--stray too close, and that could be it for you. These spiders: Hadronyche/ Atrax are to reserved for the VERY MOST EXPERIENCED, mature, and responsible hobbyists. Nuclear weapons are difficult to set off, but would you hand those out to high-school physics students? I think not.., and Aussie f-webs ARE easy to "set off"!

Dendryphantes noxiosus is another case, shall be lethal. Evidence, bite cases? Nothing.

A member of the genus Mastophora shall be lethal, too. Evidence, bite cases? Nothing.

Cite your source! Dendryphantes is a Salticid, and I'm sorry but I just laugh at the thought of a deadly jumping spider. Mastophora causes mild cytotoxic sores, but I have never heard or read about any truly serious results from their bites. I just haven't heard anything about the Dendryphantes--no websites, no toxicological data, nada. Having no bites means nothing--Sicarius have caused hardly any bites in humans, but we know they are genuinly deadly. There is a reason we've heard about Sicarius, and there is a reason we don't hear about Mastophora and Dendryphantes: Sicarius is genuinly deadly, and the others aren't. Your citation of Mastophora and Dendryphantes is NOT a valid comparison to Phoneutria and Atrax/ Hadronyche.

All you guys talk about “dangerousness”, but lack the understanding that you´re indeed talking about “toxicity” in a chemical meaning: you´re talking about just the chemical activity of toxins of different species, genera and even families.
This has NOTHING to do with a level of danger.

No one here, me included, is able to come up with a danger evaluation of the person who started the thread, as there are just many factors that needed to be included in such an analysis that we all just can´t know. Even if we could, we´d have to do this for any single species of funnel web spider, as the thread starter didn't specify which species he wants to keep.

As for "dangerousness," yes, this is calculated on a number of factors, such as:

*venom strength

*venom dosage

*likelihood of injecting = willingness to bite + ability to enact a bite ( where "ability to enact a bite" equals the species' speed, agility, jumping ability, effective bite/ strike. )

In short: will it bite, can it get to me, how bad is its venom, and how much venom will I get?

In terms of Phoneutria:

willingness to bite: affirmative, high
ability to inflict bite: affirmative, very high
strength of venom: strong
dosage of venom:--USUALLY fairly small.

Phoneutria CAN inject a massive amount of venom, but per my reading, they usually are very stingy with it, and inject only very small amounts of venom. That still is not something you can rely on, however, and keepers of Phoneutria should know that their spiders CAN inject huge amounts of very toxic venom--if they so choose. Feeding bites ( as opposed to defensive bites ) could be truly hazardous to one's health.

Atrax / Hadronyche are even worse:

willingness to bite: affirmative, very high
ability to inflict bite: affirmative, high
strength of venom: very strong
dosage of venom: --this is a key factor in this comparison: in keeping with higher venom potency, A/H inject much more venom than a Phoneutria sp.

In terms of venom comparison, A/H have a higher number of toxins than Phoneutria, none of which are as strong individually as Phonutria toxin. Ph' venom has a terribly potent single toxin, but which is relatively dilute in the venom matrix when compared with the toxin abundancy of the A/H's venom, which has 14 distinct toxins! Now, these 14 toxins are all weaker than the Ph's single toxin, but when put together as a whole, they make an overall much worse venom.

Neither spider should be kept by inexperienced hobbyists, as a mistake is still all too easy, and the costs of mistakes FAR too high. Even a single P.fera bite means a trip to the hospital, and perhaps a very serious one at that.

These spiders are NOT "half as dangerous as some people here announce," they are genuinely highly dangerous.

 

[Drachenjager]

Furthermore by the way, "venomous" as a term is used if you have consumed something venomous, like Fugu that hasn´t been treaten properly. If talking about animals that inject venom, we´re talking about toxic here.

Venomous refers to a creature capable of injecting a toxic substance into an enemy or prey. Poison is somethign toxic that was not injected , but eaten or drank or absored through the skin , inhaled ect. I believe you missed something in translation here. A venomous creature can bite and inject a toxic substance. A poisonous creature does not, you would have to consume that creature...or lick it or somethign of that sort. A poison can me taken from them and put on an arrow or dart and used by humans like wiht the poison dart frogs .

And yes EVERYONE assumes the hot bugs like the sidney funnel web, but thats what happens , most people even bug people think of that one when they hear funnel web. There are some funnel web spiders native to Texas , dont know how potent the venom tho.

 

[Crotalus]

Just a note:
As for funnels dont climb on glass - true, but many web up the enclosures with web all the way up to the edges, and they move very well in the silk.

It seems there is often two camps when it comes to discuss the danger of keeping these spiders;
those who exaggerate the danger
and those who totally underestimate the danger.

These animals do occur in the wild and a bite from them in the field might be much worse then been bitten at home where its close to hospital.
Any animal with a potent venom, documented potent venom, are a risk. Anyone should understand that. But, they can be kept safely - if the keeper are aware of the animals potential and house them accordingly. This goes for both venomous spiders, scorpions and snakes.

 

[EK2]

The following is a quite reputable source on the subject, that has included input from Hospitals, museums, and experts outside medicine. Unofficial cases still an ongoing area of study.

http://www.mja.com.au/public/issues/182_08_180405/isb10564_fm.html

Can anyone forward some info on African and American Hexathelidae? Asian Macrothele etc. Have heard that they have found a new species in Thailand called Allagelena monticola, in the highlands. Any word on this from north America or Europe scholars?

 

[Steve Nunn]

Hi,
H.valida (Toowoomba Funnel-web) adult female in captivity:

And a definite tough species to keep happy in captivity, almost impossible (almost ), H.formidabilis (Northern Tree Funnel-web):

I won't offer an opinion on whether or not these should be kept, if you're nutty like me, you might try I guess

Cheers,
Steve

 

[Venom]

It seems there is often two camps when it comes to discuss the danger of keeping these spiders;
those who exaggerate the danger
and those who totally underestimate the danger.

But we know which of those two attitudes is the safer one to have! I try not to exaggerate anything, but to be as factual as possible. I do find myself emphasizing the hots' threat, however, due to the other camp who nay-says their danger. I know I might sound exaggerated or like a broken record at times, but safety cannot be overemphasized with these species, especially when people who should know better go about trying to convince us that certain species "aren't that bad." We have less experience people on here who read these things, and if they see some "expert" saying "bah, that species isn't so bad," they might go and act carelessly with one. This forum sees flippant attitudes all the time toward Loxos, and now that attitude has been applied to A/H and Phoneutria, so you bet I'm going to do my best to shoot it down! If that means I sound exaggerated, so be it.

 

[Crotalus]

True. I wasnt refering to you acctually.
I wish people would regard these spiders the same way as venomous snakes, when it comes to safety and when it comes to who should keep them.
With a attitude that they dont kill people it encourage not so experienced people to get one.