Check Your Boots!

“I went camping with a small group of scouts this weekend. Sunday morning, one of the kids was putting on his hiking boots (parked under the vestibule over night).

Being a responsible lad, he looked in the boots first to see if any critters had taken up residence over night. Sure enough, there was a very substantial black spider in the right boot with a very pronounced red violin shape on the underbelly, just waiting for some nice fresh toes to latch on to. This was the biggest, scariest looking black widow I have ever seen.

In my opinion, aracnophobia is just good judgment. Scary, hateful little beasties with too many legs.”

“oh, GROSS!! that is seriously my worst nightmare. good thing he looked!”

“OMG! THAT'S something that I fear too! I HATE those things.... no matter WHAT kind they are! Spiders have a good function, I know, but that doesn't mean that I have to LIKE them!

A blackwidow no less! JEEZE! Poor kid! I can imagine how scarry that was for him! What did you all do with it? Mush it I hope.... :-/”

“We put him in a bottle with a little alcohol for junior to bring to school. Not as rewarding as "mushing," but equally fatal.”

“My boots always come INside the tent with me!”

“Good to know! And may I ask.... just WHERE were you all at when this critter took to hanging out in his boot??

(Mental note to self: wherever they went.... DO NOT GO THERE!) hehe!”

“Found one of my outbuildings, sort of like a barn but not quite, is infested with brown recluse (sp?)spiders. Now that I finally saw the little buggers I can't go in there without gloves and major paranioa. Lots a stuff does not scare me, nasty flesh erroding spiders, oh yeah , they get to me. Used some of those cool chemicals I'm not supposed to have to nuke em but some seem to have survived.”

“Coyote13,

Said spider was located on a hilltop on private land near Selma, Albama (absolute middle of nowhere).”

“K! Good to know!

(Checking list of places where DEADLY critters live... Alabama.... Texas..... my backyard.....)

J/K!

How did the class and teachers respond? Would love to hear about that!”

“ooooo, brown recluses' are yucky! That's the only spider we have in Michigan to worry about. We really don't have too much to worry about in Mich. Only one poisonous snake, hardly any bears, shy cougars, just a few (and far between) wolves, friendly moose. We pretty much just have to worry about deer ticks (lyme disease) and skunks and the dreaded chipmunks, red squirrels and dastardly racoons!”

“Friendly moose?

They're awfully big to be friends~%^]”

“I try to avoid killing spiders - they tend to eat stuff that I really don't want around - but the poisonous ones can be scary. I'm no expert, but I think black widows are basically everywhere. When I was doing a lot of land surveying, we would have to pop manhole covers off and measure the depth - lots of them in those places, yikes! However, I don't think the bw's are deadly for most people, while brown recluses can be. My boots generally come into the tent with me.”

“I always shake those puppies out before slipping 'em over the dogs.

Ya trained 'em well, Gear Junkie.

Do you live in Selma? My sis married into a Selma family...”

“They are friendly! They just ignore you and keep on eatting.”

“did ya smoke it?”

“selma is the middle of nowhere?...i thought the entire state was the middle of nowhere

yea alabama has all of the us's poisonious snakes, spiders, scorpions, turkey sized mosquitos, ticks, chiggers, coyotes, wild dogs, black bears (few), panthers(few), alligators, and squirrels...dear god save us from the squirrels most of all!!!”

“we have a dog you know.”

“When returning from europe or England, do they still make you check your shoes, or walk in that solution (to dis-infect the Mad Cow disease) before walking on U.S soil?”