To ask why so many people kill spiders

[McNewPants2013]

What is so scary about them.

They make the most amazing webs and these webs catch flys.

I got bitten by a spider down south years ago. Had two bloody fang marks through my tights and it took ages to stop bleeding. Within hours I couldn't bear any weight on my foot and it was swollen from toe to knee! Spiders are nasty!

Sorry but I kill them. I'm terrified of them. I can't go near them to put a glass over them incase they run at me. If H is in he deals with them.

Ive been bitten by one too.

I kill the mofos. They can lie anywhere in the world peaceably apart from inside my house.

I'm scared of them, but would never kill one. My dad got me a spider catcher thing for Christmas, best present ever!

Because sometimes the easiest way to get rid of them is to make them go back down the plug hole they just came out of, or to Hoover them up.

I have a.pet house spider, Sam

Kill him, I kill you

I am terrified of them in my house - I can tolerate them else where with a deep breath and deliberate not looking at them - they just freak me out

we have on in the garage we call 'mouse spider' as it is the size of a small mouse!

in my house though I have to kill them - I can't bare the thought of them touching me :(

I am only scared if it is big and crawling up my top, arm, whatever, but I would never kill one, or a wasp - I will trap and release wasps and leave spiders, they will be killed by my cat if they are not careful to stay off the floor.

I can't even kill ants that come into the house, I do throw them out in a pathetic attempt to disorientate them so they don't lead their friends in.

I remember seeing a child walking down a street about 10 yrs ago and there was one of those funny beady bodied, long legged spiders(the non-hairy kind) just walking across the pavement - the horrid boy stopped and side stepped just so he old kill it.

I am impressed by the children in South America who go hunting tarantulas, which they kill then cook, for their afternoon snack - without a helicopter parent hovering in the background!

We don't kill spiders in this house, we love them... move them to places of safety and, in some little people instances, cut up little bits of ham and put it in their webs if we think they didn't catch something to eat that day...

I'm particularly fond of the stripey legged variety, I call them all "Bertie".

Now moths - and twiddlebugs - they can all become extinct for all I care and I'm happy to help them achieve that if they cross my path!

I don't kill them but once had a weird jumpy one chase me and threw a DM boot at it.

Other than that one I am a spider lover!

But... If completely phobic I don't know what I would do

Aaah now I'm itchy and scanning the room constantly!

I hate them. Absolutely hate them. They're all hairy and come out of nowhere and have billions of eyes. Bleugh.

What is a twiddlebug?

so killing spiders makes it rain? then I must hold my hands up and take full responsibility for Britain's weather!
as wrong as it is, I just cannot leave a spider be. they have too many legs!

my mum used to remove them for me when i lived at home and I was happy with that arrangement but obviously I grew up and moved out just didn't grow out of the fear of spiders

apologies to spider lovers. I've tried to leave them be and just find myself watching their every move but then I have to go off to do something abd can't risk not knowing where the bugger has gone.

Because they scare the shit out if me. If I DP or the dog doesn't kill it then it will kill me while I sleep

What's that horrific statistic about how many spiders the average person swallows in their sleep over a lifetime? Urgh urgh urgh fucking hairy-legged bastards.

Scarlet I would have actually died.

Samu doesn't putting house spiders outside kill them anyway?

Wallison... It's apparently, a woodlouse, I had to check. I've been blithely calling them 'twiddlebugs' without the faintest clue of what I've been talking about...

We never kill spiders. And if we spot nests anywhere in the house we are careful not to get rid of them.

Spider lovers here!

Did you know that you can get bitten by a black house fly? I never knew this until one day recently when I was lying on my bed. There was a fly buzzing about that I was batting off me from time to time. I suddenly felt a sharp bitey pain on my leg... the fly was there. I brushed it off and I had a pin prick mark from a bite. I was still contemplating that this must have been a coincidence when the fucker got me again!

Yes, I exterminate spiders as a rule.

Thank you, LyingWitch, I kill them too. At least they don't move as fast as spiders though!

Because I'm petrified of them after waking up one morning, aged 9, with one covering my eye.
I can't scream when I see one or it will jump into my mouth - even if it's the other side of the room. I usually just whimper a lot until DH eanders along to see what's up and has to deal with it. Then deal with me crying and scratching.
Not afraid if anything else, though: snakes, rats, Peter Stringfellow!

I never kill spiders. I do sometimes relocate huge ones to the outhouse as they worry me if they are wandering about in a "I'm about to suddenly run right over your chest while you watch TV" sort of way. This stems from the biggest one I'd ever seen running right over the white pillow I was using to lay dd on while she bf, she was about 6m old and I so nearly dropped her onto the floor, I screamed and frightened her half to death. I was so big that when DH got it into a large-ish jam jar, it only fitted in the bottom with its legs hunched up. It was almost the size of my hand.
I do kill clothes moths as they are eating half my clothes to bits, but even then I feel very guilty.

I love spiders. They are so interesting and complicated.
Their breathing system is completely different from other invertebrates- they have 'book lungs' where the oxygen diffuses in through super-thin sheets of tissue in a book formation. They can hold their breath underwater for aaaages.
Their hearts run down the centre back of the abdomen where your spine would be.
They shed their skins so many times to get from the tiny teeny pinhead-sized spiderling to the bigger spider you see in your house.
Then people squash them like they're some hideous worthless vermin. It's sad!

I figured wouldn't kill a spider outside etc as that is where it lives. Its natural habitat if you will...

But come into my house, my natural habitat and I will have it killed.

Spider doesn't show mercy to flies in its own house, should I show them mercy in mine?

Nah!

I consider it bad luck to kill a spider. Not sure whether it is generally thought to be bad luck, or whether I have just made it up? Some are allowed to live in my house and others are evicted! Small - medium ones I can do myself, but I did once scream my head off and go and get my very manly neighbour to sort it when a very large one fell out of the cardigan I was about to put on. And there was once an absolutely humungous brute on the stairs that I was was very scared of - I actually phoned dh at work to come and get it (he was working 5 mins up the road at the time). I was around 8 months pregnant and sounded so scared on the phone that he didn't even wait to hear why I wanted him to come home and raced back thinking it was baby related. That was quite embarrassing!