False Widow Rabbit Death?

[moonturtle]

This may be true or it may not be true. Although I do have a severe phobia of spiders, I am not trying to demonize them. But, some spiders do have venomous bites, like the brown recluse and black widow. It is quite possible that a spider bite could kill a rabbit. I know spiders will only bite if startled, the rabbit could of kicked or moved quickly scaring the spider. I know how important spiders are in killing horrible bugs such as certain flies or mosquitos. I don't know why I am so scared of them. Phobias run in my family. My mother is terrified of snakes, my sisters is terrified of clowns. I think this story could have a ring of truth, but I don't think we need to go on a spider witch hunt.

 

[Crunchie]

This may be true or it may not be true. Although I do have a severe phobia of spiders, I am not trying to demonize them. But, some spiders do have venomous bites, like the brown recluse and black widow.

Neither of these two species are native to the UK though, there have been no recorded human deaths from spider bites over here at all and no confirmed domestic animal deaths as far as I'm aware either.

Not saying it's be completely impossible for this rabbit to have died from a spider bite but would also say its about as likely as me being elected as the next Pope.

 

[moonturtle]

I, sadly, do not know enough about the ecological system of the UK to know about spiders. We have both of those species in the States.

 

[Crunchie]

I, sadly, do not know enough about the ecological system of the UK to know about spiders. We have both of those species in the States.

We have a complete lack of any remotely dangerous animals over here. We've several hundred species of spider but only a few are even capable of biting and none have been responsible for any deaths. Even our one vemonous snake is a bit of a wuss.

 

[William]

I, sadly, do not know enough about the ecological system of the UK to know about spiders. We have both of those species in the States.

I have both those species where i live We have in my state I think 7 species of venomous spiders, all widows and recluses. I've found a black widow in my yard with an egg sac, and I used to find lots and lots of brown widow egg sacs. Haven't seen any in a while though.

But yeah they generally don't bother people or pets, usually only if they're cornered will they bite. My uncle got bite by a brown recluse once, when he was in bed he thinks. Maybe he rolled over on it or something. He treated it at home (because he knew how to treat it as a hospital would treat it, back then at least) and had a nasty wound, his skin was ate away where the bite was, and then a long time later it would reoccur and heal again.

 

[moonturtle]

I know this is now getting off topic, but what state William? I am from Ohio and don't think I have ever seen a recluse or widow, but we get HUGE garden spiders and those horrible orb weavers on the side of the house in summer at night. I love things like gardening and helping my father with the wood pile (we have a fireplace and we have to chop wood and move it around each year,) but I am always so scared to do those things because I know I am going to see a spider. I made a friend here go into a convenient store for me to grab me a soda because there were too many orb weavers on the building and I was terrified one would fall on me. My school has educational books on everything and anything for the kiddos and they have a book on spiders. I hide the book because the pictures make my palms sweaty and my heart race. When they find it, they excitedly want to show me the pictures and I just have to smile and deal with it.

We get those huge brown spiders in our basement this time each year, they are coming in from the cold, and I always thought they were garden but maybe they are recluse (no pictures please to ask if this is what I see, I really can't handle pictures. The previous ones were bad enough.)

 

[William]

I'm in Florida.
Are the orb weavers banana spiders (Nephila clavipes)? I love those! I see them sometimes on the side of the house or on trees. They're beautiful

Brown recluse are medium sized - full grown they're about the size of a quarter, including their legs, and they usually have a fiddle marking on their back but they may not depending on age and moulting. If that sounds similar you might want to be careful when going in the basement. Hopefully they're not!

 

[Rupert & Tia]

Well, we had to evict 5 false widows from our shed on fridy night - i don't normally get rid of webs from around the shed, after all spiders eat flies don't they... but the web was ridiculously big, and on friday night they had made the web over the door and one of the spiders was big (about the size of a 50p piece) and i'd been paranoid about them biting R&T anyway... but i locked R&T in on friday night and there was 5 of them in the web / under the shed canopy... i locked them in and then could only see 4 of them so i had a major meltdown (im not good with things touching me) which had me in a full blown panic attack so wewent out with a brush to get rid of the web. I'm so scared of them biting R&T 3 are still unaccounted for we got rid of 2

I know they only bite if scared and i know theyre not venomous, but it'd be just our luck that we or the rabbits would be allergic

 

[moonturtle]

This is why I am so glad Bojangles is a house bunny. I sweep around everyday to keep the bugs at bay. Worse thing I found in my apartment was a cockroach. I saw it on the floor and thought it was one of Bo's hairballs (she was shedding badly.) She hopped past it and it scurried away. I grabbed a shoe and went looking for whatever it was. I found it under the scale (or as Bo calls it her pedestal,) and saw it was a cockroach before I smushed it. I immediately sent a text to my boss complaining about finding a cockroach in my apartment (they pay the rent and are responsible for things like repairs and pest control.) They gave me poison and traps that I was concerned about using, fearing Bo would get into it. I haven't seen another cockroach since. I think it attached to me outside. I was wearing a long skirt that day and you know how bugs sometimes attach themselves to long skirts and dresses.