Man-eating spiders in Canada????
Last year (our first in Canada) I was quite horrified to see lots of very large webs in the trees. Now, I am terrified of spiders and wondered just what kind of humongous spider could spin webs that sometimes were a foot in diameter.
With some trepidation I went onto the Internet to look up these strange beings. I could not find anything, so I changed my search criteria and found much to my surprise and relief they were not spiders but moths – phew.
Apparently the “web” contains all the larvae for the caterpillars and protects them from predators. The caterpillars hatch in the webs and then crawl out. They are called tent caterpillars.
So if you happen to spot large, horrible looking webs in the trees they are not huge man-eating spiders but harmless moths and caterpillars.
So, there you go, you learn something every day!
On another topic, I have finally heard back about my MRI/ultrasound stuff. I have an appointment in two weeks to see the gynaecologist to discuss the results, so hopefully I will get a resolution to this long-lasting saga.
3 Comments
Hi Jane … I’m taking it that it is good news since you have to wait two weeks for an appointment. I just read this blog today about the spider’s web and today CNN had this on their site about a GIANT spiderweb in Texas. Don’t read it if you are really scared but it is interesting. http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/08/30/spider.web.ap/index.html
Oh my God. That has put me off going to Texas for life!
I knew spiders were evil, deceitful creatures and the fact they all group together to do this proves my point.
Did I mention we get jumping spiders here in Canada?
You have answered a question that we posed loads of times during our last trip to Canada. We spotted those huge webs in the trees but friends couldn’t tell us what had made them. Now I will move to Canada with peace of mind!!