We followed a company that did black widow exterminator work and took pictures of the black widows, the spiders that are the most venomous spiders in North America.
It is said that the most dangerous spiders are the ones that you don’t see, but with black widows, it’s different. You can often find them in your home eating insects and their webs are mainly close to the ground so they are easy to spot. Black widow spiders have shiny black bodies with long legs and red hourglass shapes on their abdomens under their bellies. They are very venomous so if you see one of these spiders it’s best to just leave it alone unless you have a container to capture it.
Aside from black widow, we also saw many other spiders such as the cicada killer, which was about 3 inches long and quite scary to see. Cicada killers are large and hairy with bluish wings. They were hunting for their prey, the cicadas, during this time of year. Other than that we also found wolf spiders and big brown recluse spiders. The wolf spider is named after its quick movements and ability to pounce suddenly on prey while running or standing still; it has a dark gray or black body with light stripes all over its back, but these stripe patterns vary greatly among individuals.
We took pictures of all these spiders to show people that it’s not scary to take pictures of spiders, but that you just need to be careful and know how to capture them.