Pages

▼

Saturday, July 30, 2011

Shelob Lives!

This morning my lovely wife decided it was a perfect day for gardening, which she enjoys.  Of course her participation consists of writing a "to-do" list and handing it to me.  As she is my wife, I am terrified of her, so it was off to the garden with me.  Little did I know the horror that awaiting me...

There I was picking cucumbers, lettuce, tomatoes and eggplants, merrily checking off this that that from the list.  I was blissful in my servitude until I stumbled upon Shelob herself.  A demon spider that was at least 10 feet long.  Ok, 10 feet or three inches but it was really big.   Just for scale the fence strakes are 2 inches apart.

DAMN YOU SAMWISE GAMGEE - WHY DIDN'T YOU FINISH THE JOB WHEN YOU HAD THE CHANCE!!!!!!!!!

This is no normal spider, it's big and I even got a picture of it shooting it's white jagged lighting ray of icky spider death.  Look at the picture as it nearly cost me my life.  It also has some form of mind control capabilities - just after catching sight of this horror I was overcome with a desire to leave the garden.

Hmmmm, maybe there was something more to my wife's insistence that my insurance policy be updated....

SPIDER UPDATE!!!!!!!!
I decided to use the Web to find out what kind of spider I have in the Garden (thank you Al Gore!).  I was sure it was either some form of man-eating, venom shooting, irradiated mutation with name like "Death Stalker"or "Widow-Maker".  I'm pretty sure I've seen one of them face Godzilla in one of those movies from the 60's.

Deftly my fingers searched the web, google-fu in full contact mode and I discovered the species -"Argiope Aurantia" better known as the "Yellow Garden Spider".  The spider is harmless to man (if one doesn't count causing the heebie-geebies as harmful) and are viewed as a good thing to have in the garden as they are voracious eaters of pests.

Kind of a let down, isn't it.  While a Argiope Aurantia is viewed as a "good spider", it's still damn big!
at

15 comments:

  1. BigLeeJuly 30, 2011 at 10:44 AM

    Holy frak thats big... shudder. Sorry, i'm not a spider person. Is it a poisonous variety (excuse my ignorance)?

    When I first got into wargaming about 20 years ago I had a a WFB undead army which included a giant spider. The model was Games Workshop, 100% white metal, cost a small fortune, and was about the same size as a real Tarantula. It was awsome in battle, but I didn't like looking at it on the games table. Just remembering it gives me a cold shiver down my spine (what a whimp!).

    ReplyDelete
  2. john de terre neuveJuly 30, 2011 at 10:57 AM

    Wow

    ReplyDelete
  3. DeanMJuly 30, 2011 at 11:48 AM

    Wow - that is a pretty awesome photo - great timing. Something that would be in Nat'l Geographic or something. Regards, Dean

    ReplyDelete
  4. Neil ScottJuly 30, 2011 at 11:54 AM

    Wow, that is a rather large looking beastie, no wonder you retreated

    ReplyDelete
  5. tradgardmastareJuly 30, 2011 at 11:58 AM

    WOW indeed...
    Alan

    ReplyDelete
  6. PhyllionJuly 30, 2011 at 12:23 PM

    Terrifying! Poisonous species round your parts? Definitely time to settle those nerves with a little painting.

    Phyl
    Http://infrequentwargamer.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete
  7. Paul´s BodsJuly 30, 2011 at 4:02 PM

    She´s lovely...you are lucky to se such a nice example. great pic..thanks
    Cheers
    paul

    ReplyDelete
  8. Jason MeyersJuly 30, 2011 at 4:17 PM

    Yikes!! Awesome storytelling though. :)

    ReplyDelete
  9. Christopher(aka Axebreaker)July 30, 2011 at 6:40 PM

    Creative storytelling and yes indeed that is big!

    Christopher

    ReplyDelete
  10. Paul O'GJuly 30, 2011 at 8:03 PM

    Big? Nah, that aint big Miles! Here Down Under we have these spiders that will carry off your kids when you aren't looking. And that's if a dingo doesn't get them first! And you cant chase them into the bush to get them back because of all the poisonous snakes. And God forbid you go swimming - because of all the sharks. Much better to just stay inside and paint my models....

    :-)

    ReplyDelete
  11. ColCampbell50July 30, 2011 at 8:53 PM

    Great looking specimen. We have them occasionally at our house here in Mississippi. Always nice to look at. At least you didn't get surprised by a 2.5' snake trying crawl into your garage! Of course Severus (as my wife dubbed it - Severus the Snake) was just a king snake who is one of the best type of snake to have around as they eat rodents and other, poisonous snakes.

    Jim

    ReplyDelete
  12. LandorlJuly 30, 2011 at 10:13 PM

    We have a lot of ones just like that where I live. On their back they have some white markings that look just like a skull. I also thought that they had to be some sort of deadly venomous spider. Something like "Death Skull Spider". It turns out that it is non-venomous, and is called a banana spider or the Golden silk orb-weaver.

    ReplyDelete
  13. AdrianAugust 1, 2011 at 1:15 PM

    Funniest post on a wargaming blog ever.

    Definitely a BSS. (Big Scary Spider)

    ReplyDelete
  14. Steve-the-WargamerAugust 9, 2011 at 3:38 AM

    My missus would have left the continent by now if she'd seen that... :o))

    ReplyDelete
  15. ArthurSeptember 5, 2011 at 7:46 PM

    They are quite friendly and will eat gunk out of your hand, until the day they discover your hand tastes better than the gunk you were feeding them!

    Just saying...

    Regards

    ReplyDelete