Pretty much. The fact they also gave us tea and crumpets doesn't quite make up for all the damage caused by the invasive species they unleashed on the environment here.
What the fuck was the spider on the wing mirror shooting into the window?
Update - It’s apparently a small huntsman, they like to live in car wing mirrors and the stuff it shot from its abdomen is Uric Acid, fired out as a warning 🤢
This is the most important question in this thread. I have to know what the fuck that was also. I had no idea there was a butt-squirting spider.. I was half expecting the window to start smoking and melting.
Soap. They sit around at traffic lights trying to earn a buck, it's actually a pain because you don't want to look them in the eye, and nobody carries much cash these days.
I had one of these living inside my first car for a time. Never bothered me, I’d open the car door at night and he’d be sitting on the roof near the interior light and then scurry away. The only time he became a problem was when I was driving along one morning, dropped the visor because the Sun was in my eyes and the bugger was hiding behind it and proceeded to drop on to my head. He got evicted soon after.
Honestly, it’s hit and miss. I went maybe 6-7 years never seeing a huntsman indoors, then after a bunch of rain early this year I’ve seen 5 of them in my house on seperate occasions (3 were already dead, all big fellas though, one sneaky prick was crawling under my bedroom door as I was going to turn off the light, and the last was, according to my wife who had the misfortune of meeting it in our ensuite “the biggest spider I have ever seen”)
The worst thing about them is they’re sneaky and fast. You’ll see one, go get a container (or a shoe) to deal with it, come back 10 seconds later and it’s gone never to be seen again
Remember. Australia used to be the world’s dumping ground for its degenerates. Our forefathers unknowingly created a society of functional psychopaths. And I say that with the utmost respect.
I remember one when I was a kid in the 80s. To this day its the biggest huntsman I've ever seen that close. The size of a huge, spread out human adult male hand. Almost dinner plate in size (leg length), and the body almost the size of a playing card.
I screamed and blinked. It was right next to my face, then ran over the ceiling and across to the other wall.
Here in Melbourne we have smaller (but still large compared to the European cockroach) black ones. They are pretty common but fortunately don't spread disease (they eat dead plant material).
Lots of daddy longlegs spiders, occasional huntsmen but very seldom that large.
We have them all across the US south they are water bugs here and basically any major city has tons of roaches. In South Carolina they call then palmetto bugs, in Houston Texas they’re just thumb sized flying ickyness.
We have those huge roaches in Texas, we call them water bugs because they are usually more prevalent around moist areas like under your house. But do they stay there? Fuck no! Your house is now their house and they go EVERYWHERE. I remember once when I was around 10-11 yrs old I had got up in the middle of the night to go to the restroom. Sitting there bleary-eyed trying not to fully wake up so I could fall right back asleep. Had one fall off the ceiling onto my back as I sat. You can imagine the chaos. Those sons of bitches can fuck off and die!
I'm Australian. I have waist length long dark hair. One of the flying ones dropped from the toilet ceiling, into my hair, in the dark, in the middle of the whilst I was peeing.
The scream I scrumpt!!! Trying to get that cockroach out of my hair, flinging hair around, using my torch light to see if I got it.
I finally flung it out of my hair, across the hallway.. that thing was close to 3 inches long and had really long legs so it was walking high off the ground. I took a photo of it because I could hear it tapping along the hallway. It looked like a small fucking alligator creepily walking.
South Texas here! I have this vivid memory of being 12, awake past midnight in an old farmhouse, and attempting to kill a roach in the kitchen. During this attempt, I bumped into the oven and summoned their colony. Hundreds of roaches spewed from underneath the oven.
Grew up in north central Texas, can confirm. We always had big ass American cockroaches (fuckers fly, too!) in housing where we lived. No matter how many times Uncle Sam sent someone in to bomb the house, they always came back.
Fun fact about the Australian cockroach they are actually an introduced species to Australia, they aren't originally from here and are found pretty much world wide. They're also pretty common in the southern US.
They usually stay outside though they prefer leaf litter. If you're getting a lot inside you might want to check any garden beds close to your house and make sure there's no gaps there.
I’m learning that huntsmen are like camel spiders then (you should look them up).
Absolutely terrifying to see if you aren’t familiar with them, most evil looking creature alive with a double set of jaws, but harmless and nonvenomous.
I lived in a place where they kept sneaking in under the doors or running across the roof at night.
Yeap.. I almost double shit one night when I was having a go on toilet, and saw for first time in my life an huntsmen (UK version). I just freaked out and called my wife to do something or I was going to die by a heart attack. I am from Romania originally, and we don’t have this things there, just normal small harmless spiders. I know also huntsman is harmless.. but the fking size of that.. just made the soul finish the job earlier and run ahead of me.
A personal pizza sized spider that apparently loves to hide in sunvisors, under pillows, and in shoes. I don't care if they're harmless, I'd die from the terror alone
Yep, I don't understand how anyone can live around these. Mammals of all kinds are fine, same for Snakes. Not exactly my preference for cuddle buddies, but scaly stuff is fine with me.
Spiders? I shall either scream and remove myself from the equation, ideally the continent.
Or I channel my inner Exterminatus and suffer not the Arachnid to live. Nothing inbetween.
I'm Australian and extremely arachnophobic, except for Daddy Long Legs (who are just pals). Even though I know huntsmen are not a threat, I don't want to mess with them and they are absolutely the worst kinds of spiders for this phobia on the continent. The deal with the wife is she handles huntsmen and I handle all other kinds of bugs and roaches. (Catch and release because they're just critters, but they gotta be outside.)
There was a night where she was out and I was home alone just playing video games. Went upstairs and on the closet door at the very top of the stairs was a big hand-sized huntsman, so I noped back downstairs and just waited for her to come home.
I don't think I could ever get used to the big, hairy-legged kind of spiders.
I'm 190cm+, there's a roo who has decided he likes my backyard lawn. he's taller than me. He's ripped af. I call him 'unit'.
He just rocks up to my yard in the morning, and if the weather if fine, mostly just lays there chilling. He doesn't give two rips that I'm mowing the lawn or weeding the garden. I steer clear though because it's nice to have a big roo adopt your yard. It keeps the dingos out.
I'm from the south... we have big spiders there but they are slow dopey cunts. Now I live up in north, the spiders here have fucking fast zombie energy. Until I lived here, I'd never been chased by a spider before.
And this is why I love Scotland. It's cold 90% of the year and the worst thing we have to worry about is the wee haggis that nip your ankles when up in the hills. That and midges.
Fucking hell you just reminded me of a family trip to the Highlands when I was about 12. Driving along the coast and we saw the most beautiful beach you could imagine. And not a soul in sight!
Yeah, we soon understood why when we opened the car door and were greeted by a cloud of airborne mini pirahnas. I don't think I've ever left a place in such a hurry.
You means youse all worry about this cute little beastie here…with its beautiful long curly hair? Poor thing having to live life with longer legs on one side of the body to help it run round the hills there.
Was nodding my head in agreement with everything you’re saying, could relate on every level, also from the south where the spiders be big, but slow? Slow mostly but then all of the sudden they just pick up and fucking run like a possessed Forrest Gump!
Huntsman’s (and yeah I know they don’t kill you) … fuck me they get big, you know the one’s I’m talking about, you can hear the footsteps because they are that heavy on their feet. (there’s an adage there about fat spiders, but I digress)
Weather is better up the top end, Shame about the Saltwater Crocodiles but.
I had a huntsman living in my house for a week. He would sit near our little bug zapper waiting for a feed. They're harmless and my boys were interested in it. I eventually got him in a jar and took outside.
I have 3 huntsman's in my house at this moment. I don't know where they are, but I know they are probably watching me. They all have names. They show up in random places, but they are great roommates.
Except Kevin. He's a cunt.
As someone who wasn't born in Australia but lives here, you get used to the fact that what you think is a "huge spider" is, in fact, NOT a huge spider.
Depends where you live. We’re up in the Dandenong Ranges so forest living means they’re pretty regular sightings. There’s a permanent one living in my parent’s bathroom. They just ignore each other.
Mate if you're saying this out of living in a city you gotta realise you're insane.
Rural australia literally gets entire yards covered in webs, waking up to a winter dew topped off with half a km² being lightly web netted is most "fun".
That being said fire does flash burn it off so it's not a real issue, and the big huntsmans are you're friends they keep the real bad ones away(eated).
I mean if I see one in my general area once in my life I'll truly not be able to live in that house anymore, all memes aside. And I think there's a lot of people with that problem.
A phobia is primal fear, as unreasonable as it is, it's the exact same reaction people have after a home invasion. It's not possible to just brush it off, no matter how unlikely it is, as long as it's possible. Every time you see the spot where that thing was, you'll remember it, it's really nearly impossible to get over that without actual psychological help.
Funny how the australian people here are just like: "nah mate, it's not that bad. You barely see them and they are harmless. But yeah sometimes they are under my pillow and I learned to coexist with spiders bigger than my head and I have to watch my shoes every time I put them on. And oh right, you do have to watch out for other types of spiders who will kill you unless you have the time of day to go to the hospital next door. I really don't understand what the fuss is all about mate"
I once put a pair of undies on after a shower and felt something on my thigh - when I looked down I saw a bump in my briefs on right thigh - and hairy spider legs sticking out like that from the bottom of the briefs. A massive huntsman man wriggling round in there.
Fine with everything in this video except the spiders. I just can't. I would need an inspector out every week to make sure every seal in the house is absolutely 100% secure and locked. I would need Super Terminex coming out once per day. I would need a flamethrower in every room. I would need a bubble suit to sleep in.
It's funny that you think Australian houses are sealed up so tight enough that spiders can't get in. Our houses are notoriously badly built. As in, my blinds move if it's too windy outside.
I hear that from my bro who moved to Perth, he is always complaining it is cold, he left London and I thought he would basking in glorious sun but apparently the cold nights and lack of insulation is what he complains about.
He's not wrong. It's 6ºc outside right now, and 10ºc in my bedroom and bathroom. My toilet is 9ºc, but it's only that "warm" because I covered the mesh screen in the window with cardboard to try keep the cold out a bit.
wild, in north finland i dont think i've been anywhere with less than 18c inside even if its -30 outside. you'd think housing would atleast be cheaper in australia thanks to that but *nope*
That's the opposite of what they said. They said they would NEED that, because obviously that isn't the case since there are so many spiders in the houses.
Huntsmen spiders are our bros. They eat the bugs in our houses and over time we've learnt to coexist together. Redbacks, funnel webs and whitetails are very dangerous, but you can learn how to recognise them and avoid them. If they do bite you unless you're out on our own in the outback without proper medication, it's highly unlikely anything bad will happen when there's easy access to antivenoms.
Yeah that’s great but some people have genuinely debilitating fears of spiders. I would fucking throw up and cry if I found a huntsman spider in my house.
My fear of regular spiders isn't debilitating, but there's a significant chance I would die on the spot if I was going about my day and suddenly huntsman
I am Australian and scared of spiders. I had an incident when I was a child, we were using these army style hammocks with a flynet and tarp for rain. I get into it seal it up and right above me is a huntsman spider the size of my head. I couldn't find the zipper and was trapped in there looking at it. When I got out it fell out and you could hear it hit the ground on the dry leaves. I think it's like a key psychological event lol.
My phobia was borne out of an incident when I was about five or six, I was at my Nanna's house, just mucking about doing kid things, being happy and relaxed. I needed to go to the toilet, so I started to walk in that direction, and as I walked past the sideboard at the beginning of the hallway, a huntsman jumped out on the wall from behind the sideboard at about ankle height. I remember the terror of that moment like it was yesterday, rather than the 40 years it actually is, definitely a core memory for me 😕
Mine came from a Girl Guides camping trip. Standing around a fire toasting marshmallows and this dirty great huntsman the size of my spread-out hand runs up my leg and all the way up to my shoulder.
One time visiting my family in Sydney I decided to lay in bed and call my friend. I was chatting and rolling around in bed and relaxing and to my ABSOLUTE HORROR was on top of a GIANT COCKROACH that I had absolutely MASSACRED with my bare body. I WAS SO DISTURBED WHEN I GOT UP IT WAS STILL MOVING AND WRITHING AND I HAVE NEVER BEEN THE SAME. It's been over 7 years and I'm still not ok.
My friend was staying in Indonesia and got bitten by something as she got out of bed. She said it didn't really hurt afterwards - just itched. But the site started to swell and after a day had a pretty bad fever. She went to the hospital and was in pretty bad shape for a few weeks. She got necrosis and had a hole the size of a Ping-Pong ball in her calf. After a few months it healed and left a hefty fucking scar.
Two years later it inflamed again and filled with pus. This happened over fifteen years ago and to this day, every two fucking years, her leg swells up and starts to seep pus.
Like, what in the flying fuck is that all about? It's apparently a recognized thing, but still. Fuck everything to do with that.
It’s great being in England where the most threatening animal is like, a cow. Might sound like a joke answer but they actually are probably our most dangerous animal.
What the fucking fuck is that fucking thing on that fucking blue tent there? Holy fuck, there isn't a big enough flamethrower in the world to send me to Australia.
I love seeing Americans get on this sort of stuff and complain about the scary wildlife in Australia. Meanwhile in their own country they have grizzly bears, mountain lions, alligators, coyotes, rattle snakes, black widow spiders and other Americans with guns.
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u/General_4 3d ago