I have found myself to be in a vanishingly small group of people, in that I like spiders. I chuckle at the people who blindly assert that man is obviously the pinnacle of all creation. Just look at the capabilities and engineering in a typical spider.

Anyway, I have nicely sized spider (probably an inch and a half across) crawling around my walls, keeping the insect population in check. He seems a friendly sort, he let me put the lens of my camera within two inches of him to take the attached photo. Being a spider fanboy doesn't mean I'm not cautious, however. Some of these little beasties can be downright nasty, not to mention dangerous.

Does anybody know enough about spiders to tell me whether this one is actually harmless? It is not one of the four species of spiders [Black Widow; Brown Recluse; Hobo; Yellow Sac] in North America known to be truly dangerous, but other lesser spiders can cause unpleasant effects.

tanstaafl.

Even if he weren't dangerous, the little fella would be out of my house immediately. Humanely, if possible, but one way or another he'd be gone. I have enough tiny spiders keeping my bug population down.

It's not 100 percent but I am pretty sure that is the famed "La araña hizo las heces color verde y el hombre muere mientras asfixia" spider.

I think that means something like: "When this spider bites, your intestinal mucosa turn bright green, slough off, and then leak out of your anus until your electrolytes go wacky and you have a seizure and choke on your tongue" spider.

But, again, I'm not 100 percent sure.

Hope that helps,

Thank you. I feel so much better now.

tanstaafl.

I thought it might be a Wolf Spider at first glance. Here's some reference on a few species known to be venomous, including the Wolf Spider:

http://www.termite.com/spider-identification.html

Glad I could help. I think you just to need to let that bad boy know who the alpha spider is.

"Doug es el jefe spider! Verdad???"

From that chart, it looks to me like a Hobo Spider.

I encourage spiders in my house - they have eaten 2 wasps nests over the last 2 years. Lovely.

caveat - this is the UK, and we have friendly spiders. Even big Harry, who lives in the shed and is about 3 1/2 inches across is not even vaguely dangerous to humans

You should name it Boris.

Probably not.

3- Dark rings around the legs? [Scroll to bottom of page 4] Not a hobo. If you can see dark rings around the legs of your spider (Fig. 5), THEN IT IS NOT A HOBO SPIDER. Hobo spiders have uniformly colored legs.

tanstaafl.

Wolf spider does seem most likely, the unusual eye distribution, the "Union Jack" pattern on the cephalothorax, and general hairiness points that way. But Wolf Spiders are outdoor, burrowing spiders, mine hangs out indoors on the wall, so that gives an element of uncertainty.

tanstaafl.

It could be a Sheep Spider. In Wolf's clothing.

I just want to chime in here and express my gratitude that all spider-related pictures in this thread have been merely links as opposed to inline photos.

And yeah, I've heard that Wolf spiders can get pretty darn big, i.e., nearly Tarantula-sized.

Tony, we've printed out all the picture and have mailed them in plain brown envelopes to your work and home addresses. Look out.

I went to a lecture on spiders where the lecturer told us that there were more 100 spiders in the average house, I think that if we want to talk nasty spiders, we need some Australian input!

And we swallow 100 spiders every year in our sleep

I kid, your figure actually sounds plausible. Certainly more than my urban myth

And I second Tony's statement...

Figure 11,000 spiders per acre in cultivated land.

tanstaafl.