Spiders...

I've actually lost a couple of posts due to some sort of collision in cyberspace. But, not to worry. This is one I found rather interesting.

A couple of nights ago, I was watching CSI:NY. One young character, it was finally established, died from the bite of the "Brazilian Wandering Spider". This name was repeated a number of times.

This is the Brazilian Wandering spider.


I really dislike eight-legged creatures, and I'm aware that, here in Australia, we have a few of the nasties. I also get a little peeved when television programs all over the world use an item/animal, whatever, and it is so wrong. Is the international viewing community so little thought of that producers couldn't be bothered with accuracy? I mean, come on! Every arachnaphobe knows a deadly spider when they see it, hell we know the not-so-deadly ones, too.

It's not a good picture, but this is taken from CSI:NY


If anyone remembers the episode "Zoo York" (yeah, I know we're a long way behind, but what can you do?) you'll recall Stella 'milking' the aforementioned Brazilian Wandering Spider.

Nuh, not even close. It looked more like this:

Atrax Robustus, commonly known as the Sydney Funnelweb Spider.

Although I suspect that the spider on the carpet is something harmless (Can't really have a deadly spider running around, can we?). The part of the program I refer to is when Stella is 'milking' the damn thing. Two thoughts here: no one in their right mind would pick up a deadly spider to milk it that way - FYI pipettes are used so fingers are nowhere near fangs - and two, the image that stays in my mind is that it was a Funnelweb spider, a big one, all glossy carapace, big, downward striking fangs, spinnerets on its butt... I could be wrong, but I have seen 'em that big; down at the Snowy Mountains, yep, they're BIG.

I'd like to think that U.S. production teams would do better in authenticating their props. Guess I was wrong... again. Next thing you know, they'll be calling our Red-back spider a "Black Widow"!