Invasion of the Monster Spiders

I felt something big and mysterious crawling down my neck and that can be a thrilling experience! I was walking in the woods and it’s not unusual to have bugs try to hitch a ride, but this insect was rather large.

I first thought it was a Daddy long legs, but as I snatched the critter off my neck, I realized it was a very large spider, a Juros spider to be exact! They are huge spiders, up to 3-4 inches across and they look like they escaped from a horror movie!

The first Joros to arrive in the U.S. were likely stowaways on shipping containers. Now that they’re here, the chances of Joros hitching a ride to a new locale on a car or in luggage are high.

But that’s still no reason to panic. The spiders are relatively harmless to people and pets, making their presence more of a nuisance than dangerous. Joros won’t bite unless cornered, and their fangs are often not large enough to break human skin. The spider seems pretty docile, but I would not press my luck and try to get it to bite me- no way!

The bright yellow, blue-black and red spiders’ golden webs can be all over power lines, in trees around town and even on your front porch anytime of year, but more common in summer.

The Joros spider arrived stateside around 2013 and has since spread across the state and Southeast. But new research from the University of Georgia suggests the invasive arachnids could spread through most of the Eastern Seaboard of the U.S.

Joros don’t appear to have much of an effect on local food webs or ecosystems, says Andy Davis, researcher at the Odum School of Ecology at UGA. They may even serve as an additional food source for native predators like birds.

“People should try to learn to live with them,” he said. “If they’re literally in your way, I can see taking a web down and moving them to the side, but they’re just going to be back next year.” They seem cold weather tolerant and are only going to spread in the years ahead.

I see the new spider as a curio in the outdoors and just try to walk around them, but their large sticky webs can be a challenge to avoid when walking outdoors. These monster spiders are here to stay!

HHJ News