What is this Spider??

Not sure if this is where I post this at but I need some help in identifying this spider I found while crawling around under my house, There were tons of webs but only a few of these buggers, I have looked at lots of sites but cannot seem to find any info. I would like to know if it is these that are biting us at night while sleeping.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.


Here is a photo I snapped of it....(the best I could get)

Looks like a sac spider to me.

Agrarian sac spider

Sac spiders are the probable cause of more spider bites than any other kind of spider, and their bites are probably often misdiagnosed as brown recluse bites by health care providers.

Might want to look around in the foliage since they don't really spin webs to catch prey in.



Sac spider bite....ouch!

Thanks Regenmacher, but the bites we get are not that nasty, also if this might help we live in the country not the city, lots of woodland around us.

it looks a lot like a Daddy Long Legs spider. If it is, they're harmless. Their fangs aren't long enough to penetrate human skin

ill vouch for that. it is a daddy long legs

yep, its definately a daddy long legs spider! It can't hurt you its fangs cannot penetrate the skin. Very very common here.

A Daddy longlegs/harvestman (Phalangids) abdomen and cephalothorax are joined, and the photo above shows two distinct seperate sections.

There is an urban legend claiming that the harvestman is the most venomous spider in the world, only its fangs are too small to bite a human, and is thus not actually dangerous. This is untrue on several counts. First, of course, phalangids are not spiders. Many species don't have any poison glands at all. Of those that do, the venom appears to be far less toxic than that of a black widow spider. The size of the fangs varies by species, of course, but even those with relatively long fangs are not known to bite humans (or other large creatures). The urban legend is probably due to confusion with the Daddy long-legs spider, which can indeed bite and is indeed venomous, but not dangerously so. More can be read on the debunking of this myth on the Daddy long-legs spider page.

en.wikipedia.org...

Above photo also shows the legs are not the same as a Phalangids below.

Look closer....



__________________________


Daddy longlegs (Pholcus) the true spider and not a harvestman.

There is an urban legend stating that daddy long-legs spiders have extremely toxic venom, but their fangs cannot penetrate human skin. This myth is untrue, the spider can penetrate human skin, and the venom is completely harmless to humans.
en.wikipedia.org...

A photo from the top down of the for mentioned spider, rather than a profile view, would clear up discrepancies

[edit on 2-2-2006 by Regenmacher]

its a daddy longlegs. i got one above my computer now. it looks the same as the photo. also they can penetrate the skin with there fangs, they did a thing on mythbusters showing that they can although there bite is fairly weak.

I've noticed after living in different parts of the US that people have many different names for critters. While I don't know the "real" name of the spider in the first post, many people around here call them Daddy Longlegs.
The post by Regenmacher shows what I would call the "real" Daddy Longlegs.

Dustinthewind's post shows a spider common around here. They make a disorganized web that doesn't have a pretty pattern to it. If you lightly touch one of the strands the spider will gyrate in a circular motion probably to try to entangle an insect better. They do bite, but it just leaves a small itchy spot no worse than a mosquito bite. I imagine some people might be allergic to it's venom, in that case it could end up worse.

Just my 2 cents.....

Thanks everyone for the replies!
The Daddy-Longlegs spider is the one I have in the crawlspace, seems they are pretty prevalent here, I have not seen any harvestman spiders since I lived in the Dakotas, so I knew it was not those, again thanks for the comments!

What about a Cellar Spider?

Troy

I dont know what they are really called but I always heard them called house spiders. I used to istall duct work in crawl spaces ive seen thousands of those. They are very common here[Tennessee]. Yes those are the buggers biting you. they like dark places especially under beds. They are however great at insect control. From my experience with them is squish em and GET RID OF THE WEB.That will usually takes care of them.

That is not a daddy long leg. Daddy long legs are completely harmless to people. The key is that their fangs are to small to penetrate our flesh and deliver venom. The spider in the original picture will most deffinately bite you and will leave a mark from the venom interaction.

Originally posted by SoLaR513
That is not a daddy long leg. Daddy long legs are completely harmless to people. The key is that their fangs are to small to penetrate our flesh and deliver venom. The spider in the original picture will most deffinately bite you and will leave a mark from the venom interaction.

Please read the entire thread. The idea that daddy long leg spiders cannot bite humans due to small fangs is an urban legend that has been disproven over and over again. Most recently, as mentioned above, it was covered on mythbusters.

There is an urban legend stating that daddy long-legs spiders have extremely toxic venom, but their fangs cannot penetrate human skin. This myth is untrue, the spider can penetrate human skin, and the venom is completely harmless to humans. Additionally, pholcids do have a short fang structure (called uncate), but so do brown recluse spiders which can penetrate human skin and deliver potentially dangerous necrotoxin [1]. In 2004 the Discovery Channel show MythBusters set out to test this myth (season 1, ep. 13 Buried in Concrete). One of the show's hosts was bitten, and the bite produced little more than a mild short-lived burning sensation.

Daddy long-legs spider

Very well then but my point is valid. The spider in question leaves a noticable mark. I know I have them here. I see them daily. I have one that has been thriving on my back porch for some time. It is not a daddy long leg.

Originally posted by SoLaR513
I dont know what they are really called but I always heard them called house spiders.

The ones I know of that are called that are the Agressive House Spider, which we have alot of here also, 2 versions though the samall one is about 1/2" long and they are the ones that get in the house, the other one i came across was in the woodpile it was about 3 inches long and it startled me something fierce when it ran out thinking I was an insect! We also have a lot of the jumping spider variety too.

Are you sure your not refeering to wolf spiders? Sounds like we live near each other. Anyways im no expert on spiders I was just trying to help.

Ya that is what I thought at first but after searching for spiders that are prevelant here in Washington it is pretty hard to tell the difference except for the size, as far as I know wolf spiders don't get to 3" lengths, Icould be wrong though, I gonna check for some info/pics on them.

Dang it now you have me thinking about spiders. I will take a look arouind and see what I can find. I think I will enlist my girlfriend, she was a bio major. Maybe she can help.

looks to be your ordinary daddy long legs or perhaps garden spider.

its def. not a sac spider.

and in response to someones inquiry about wolf spiders being 3 inches.. i have seen one or two that may have possibly been that big, but thats if u measure it from one leg end to the end of the back legs. the body def. doesnt get that big... but damn i hate those things... when i lived with my mom we had them in the basement all the time. fast little guys too.