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I love spiders , but somewhat wary about letting them crawl over me
Those are awesome pics of the tarantulas
Some more please

About the arachnophobia folks, I really understand the problem and I understand that some people have it a LOT worse than anyone in my family and that in at least some people it is innate.
Still, genuine phobias generally are treatable, and most of them even are self-treatable. Even if you can only make yourself a little less panicky, comfortable about looking at them, just think of the advantages! It is worth a bit of work surely?
There are a lot of sites online that deal with self help with such problems, possibly because everyone who is successful wants to pass on the knowledge by way of celebration. Here are a few sites:
http://www.guidetopsychology.com/sysden.htm"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systematic_desensitization"
http://phobialist.com/treat.html"
http://hubpages.com/hub/Desensitizing-A ... ct-Phobias" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;"
There are plenty more of course, including no end of garbage, as always! All the same, if you ignore all the really useful material on the Internet just because it is buried in far larger volumes of rubbish, then you will be rejecting the most powerful and generally useful tool that modern information technology has yet yielded for humanity.
Not a good idea!!!
By way of example consider me (ahem!) On a couple of occasions so far, I have woken up from dead-deep sleep to feel something fiddling with my hair. Real baboon spider stuff! So far I have managed to maintain self-control long enough not to swat the budgie or mouse or what ever else had escaped in my room, but instead to lie still until I had guessed what was going on. In phobia mode I probably would have woken the house, dented the ceiling, and killed either a pet or a valued specimen. This does not mean that I am phobia free, not by any means, but it does mean that I have a great deal of freedom to enjoy creatures that otherwise would have ruined my life indefinitely.
You know exactly what I mean, don't you?
When we recently visited the Sterkfontein caves I found some large Opiliones (harvestmen and other popular names) and grabbed a few pictures. They are entirely harmless and very cute, but won't figure highly in most beauty contests. Also, they look a little bit like spiders, so until you are used to them, they are a bit scary. The one on the wall is the female and the one on my hand is a male. You have to be cautious in handling them or their legs break off, which is sad.
Anyway, the point is that they are good for practising getting used to handling harmless spidery things.

Even if you don't know where to find Opiliones, try some form of desensitisation. Give it a go!
And WHATEVER you do, DON"T pass on the fear to your children!!!

Jon

Emphatically not. I am not and I do not. At the time (as I think I said) I was a student and the specimen(s) were kept at the university, alive and as you have heard, breeding. Sadly, I have since lost contact with the people who at that time were in charge of the collections, so I cannot tell you what subsequently developed.
And that was about 47 years ago. My current interest in obtaining wild animals is to establish natural breeding populations in our local dams etc. So if you know who can supply say, tadpoles of Hyperolius horstockii and Amietophrynus pantherinus, I would be very happy. I'd like Xenopus gilli too, but our water is slightly alkaline, so I suspect that they might not do well, though we have at least four other species of amphibians identified as living here and there are some calls I haven't identified.
Where are you? Oh, I see, Pretoria! I am in Somerset West. If you are interested, you would be welcome to look in if you ever are in this neighbourhood.
Cheers,

Jon

Hi Jon, thanks for clearing that up! I was worried about that collection stuff, as you didn't mention that a) it was long ago, b) you were a student c) collecting for a university program. I understand now.

I have a running "battle" with a colleague at work who knows that a) I am often on the farm and in the veldt in the Free State and b) often in the veldt in winter during hunting season. Always asking me to bring him chameleons and such, as he's a collector (got quite a bit of exotic stuff, breeding small scale as well). Me always telling him to go to hell, that I never will, that it is because of people like him that things are becoming extinct!

First had to Google those scientific names you're popping there!

Arum lily frog (Hyperolius horstockii) - nope, no idea.
Western leopard toad (Amietophrynus pantherinus) - neither.
Cape Clawed Toad, Cape Platanna, or Gill's Platanna (Xenopus gilli) - that's not the "normal" platanna, is it? Too lazy to search further right now...

But you DO want interesting little critters, that's for sure!

Somerset West? Pity, we were there in December when the kids played chess in Cape Town - will probably be some time before we get down there again.

Hello Marius, sorry about that. I did realise in retrospect that I had been remiss in that respect.

Also, sorry about the delayed response. This is a very good blog in general, but I can't find any facility to email me when there is activity on any thread that I am participating in. That is a very useful facility!


I have some sympathy with guys like that who can breed species, more than with some mindless purists that refuse to permit any activity that they personally regard as "unnatural" (to the extent of shooting animals that become "too" habituated to humans or appear outside their canonical range!) !
All the same, I am worried about such activities if the animals are not free-ranging and self-sufficient. Apart from what happens if the person is no longer able to look after his wards, it seldom is possible for there to be backup. We had a caracal kitten once (legally!) and even before it was mature I had to give to to a local zoo because I was sent overseas. There were other problems as well, but with domestic animals. Fortunately we were living on a farm then, but even so it was traumatic; heaven knows what we would have done if we had been living in town without suitable contacts!



Yeah. I reckoned that you could do that if necessary, but in context the actual spp did matter!


Yep. It is slightly smaller than X. laevis, though larger than some other African spp. and has a speckled belly. It is endemic to the Cape and somewhat threatened. Our water is rather kaolin-rich where we live, so our dams are generally between pH 7 and 8, some occasionally over 8. I understand that X. gilli prefers acid fynbos waters. Dunno. Hard enough to get the others. I'd like to get some terrapins too, though people with experience tell me I'm nuts. Apparently they are not simpatico. But I don't intend handling them, and we don't have any threatened creatures in the dams to mention.



They are all interesting!!! I write a weekly few paragraphs for our newsletter, nearly all on creatures that occur in our "retirement village" and people who did not even know what occurs here are always telling me how much they love reading the stuff. For heaven's sake, are they all nuts? What is so interesting about ants? Or mossies? or reed frogs? or bee flies? Or geese? Or geckoes? or...
But somehow there always is something to write, and someone to read it...


Some time, any time... Just contact us first. We are pretty actively busy and prefer our visitors not to arrive at dooiemansdeur or have to be squeezed in between appointments!

Cheers,

Jon

Hi Jon
Tried my hardest to put your kind suggestions for overcoming my arachophobia into practice, but last night there it was!! A huge (by British standards) black 8 legged horror on our bedroom floor.
You will be very disappointed in me, but my SO kindly removed it into the garden, before I could pluck up the courage to make friends with it!
Sorry.

Gosh V, it is far too early to get guilt feelings! At least the two of you didn't just stamp on the poor little thing! Score one right there.
Try palling onto a garden web spider or a daddy long legs, or a tiny jumping spider with cute eyes and no long, spreading spider-legs. Start small and work your way up!
Oh, and get that empowered feeling by being able to capture them safely. Put a glass or something over the subject to apprehend it, then gently slide a card under the glass (gently, so as not to hurt any legs) and Bob's your spider's uncle! Then you can take her outside, put down your load, and overturn the glass gently with a stick. You can return to retrieve your equipment after your run.
All the best,
Jon

No promises Jon, but will keep you posted

I dicovered the best way to overcome my arachnaphobia is to get someone else to do all the above...

...because by the time one can think of all the advice, one has already run away or fainted.

So true.

ok so activity on this thread was aaaages ago but I so enjoyed reading the posts and thought here would be good to share... I am so glad there are others with as bad a phobia as me when it comes to rain spiders!!
I have tried to be brave many times but just have not been able to allow them to share my home space... the other day I even openend the front door and tried to send the guy out that way, waited for 30 min but then he decided no, inside was better ...
I understand all the "let them live" etc etc .... I really do, but if there is one in my house I cannot bring myself to allow them to stay... and yes, I am extremely sorry but I do spray them.... I cannot get close enough to capture... I really have tried and unfortunately 90% of the time there is no one here to help me... capture and releasing outside also doesn't stop them from coming back inside...

I cannot go to sleep knowing there is one never mind in the lounge but in the bedroom with me - how on earth can anyone? .... or like the other day, leave the house knowing there's one in the house... if I had left him alone, coming back home would have been torture!!!
I left one alone the other day in the garage... next day, there it sits glaring at me on the wall... can I leave it there? No.... but the spray I had handy was weak and when I got back, there it sat again.... stronger spray was used... I am soooo sorry!!! I feel sooo guilty every time! But like another poster - I seriously freak out when I see them ... and have to DO something.... siigghhhhh

I have had 3 rain spiders in my home and garage in the past week!!!!!!!! NO rain... West Coast area, Cape Town....
I have asked and re-asked the universe/mother nature to simply keep them outside and out of sight... then they can live - simple enough I thought... hhmmmm...
3 in one week???? And I'm a serious arachnophobe.... NOT fair LOL....

If there's a spider lover in my area whom I could call on to capture and remove them for me I would be most grateful or maybe there's someone who could come and inspect the whole place and get rid of all the ones they find??? Cos there seem to be many LOL... shudder ... and it's not even started raining yet!!!! HELP!!
I always thought them being hunting spiders there wouldn't be too many in one given space... clearly I am wrong LOL... how far do these guys travel??? And if I've had 3 in one week (small house!) are there at least another 3 hanging around... more shudders LOL
I've been in this house 1 year and 9 months and have had..... at least 10 ... that's including the 3 in the past week....

Tomorrow the 'barrier' spray will be bought and used all around the house and garage... what else can I do??
Do they eat ants??? Cos I do have a bit of an ant problem too... so either the spiders are around cos there's so many ants (outside though NOT inside!!!) but then they not doing a great job... cos the ants have gotten worse.... huge great big SIGH !!!

So here's the deal... rain spiders stay OUTSIDE and OUT of sight and you can live and eat all the ants.... ok? OK!
Or send me someone that can check for and remove any more rain spiders... the ones that will from now on stay outside and out of MY sight!

Thanks so much
Andrea

Oh I do so feel for you...I have no great love for spiders either..unless there is a pane of glass or it's on TV.....

There might be a forum member close to you willing to help you out.....

I have never seen spiders as big as the ones we saw in Africa.....

I never ever got out of bed so fast as when I awoke and saw one 3inches from my face

I went a little faster