….black widow spiders on Christian Island

If I hadn’t seen it for myself I wouldn’t have believed it.

Last week my neighbour at the cottage told me that we had to worry about black widow spiders. At first I didn’t believe her but then I saw the sign that was posted at the library in the village. Apparently they are very dangerous and if you get bitten you have to get to the hospital immediately because the venom can be deadly.

I’m not surprised that the spider has made its way to Canada in shipments of fruits and vegetables from the southern states but I am surprised that they can survive our cold and often harsh winters. It is especially cold on Christian Island in January and February and it would have been the last place that I would expect to find them.

Well last week DM came running up to my cottage to tell me that her brother came across one of these spiders while rummaging through one of his computer boxes in the loft of their cottage. He quickly took the box outside and the spider disappeared under their deck.

I can’t remember if it was the same day or the next but DM came running up to the cottage again, this time wrapped in a towel. Apparently there was another one in the outdoor shower. I went to investigate. Of course I took my camera with me.

Sure enough there was a ‘large’ spider crawling up the inside wall of the shower. DM and her brother were unsure what to do with this massive creature and they certainly didn’t want to squash it. I suggested that they find the insect spray or wasp killer while I took some photographs.

What amazed me was how this thing hissed at me when I came close with my camera. Every time I moved in closer with the camera it literally scurried behind a beam and then reappeared seconds later. The bug spray was useless but the wasp killer did the trick. Well at least we think it did. It curled up and fell to the ground between the wooden slats of the shower stall. I felt badly about killing the spider but I certainly didn’t want to be at the receiving end of its bite.

Later on we found out that it’s really only the females that are dangerous and the one I took pictures of was probably a male. We reported the sighting to the band council and they made a note of the location.

What next? First it was confirmed sightings of 3 black bears and now black widow spiders. One more thing to watch out for.