New pet keeping rules in the Netherlands

[Kieren Diment]

I particularly like it when they have babies and there are hundreds of tiny cute huntsman spiders all over the ceiling.  For a bonus, they eat cockroaches.

On 21/06/2013, at 7:39 AM, Damian Conway <damian at conway.org> wrote:

>> According to the NCIS fact sheet I looked up, in 2011 there were deaths
>> caused by camels, cats, cattle, dogs, and sheep. As well as the expected
>> killers - bees, crocodiles, emus, horses, kangaroos, sharks and snakes. No
>> mention of spiders, which I find highly suspicious.
> 
> There is actually  a simple explanation.
> 
> One of our commonest house spiders is the ominously named "Huntsman".
> (http://largestfastestsmartest.co.uk/largest-spiders-in-australia-huntsman-spider/)
> They are nocturnal and their venom is non-lethal to humans. An adult
> Huntsman will usually be 15-20cm/6-8 inches in leg-span, but they
> can easily grow up to 30cm/1ft. And they definitely prefer to live
> indoors. I would estimate that I unexpectedly encounter one in my house
> about every 3-4 weeks. The all-too-common experience of turning on the
> light in a dark room only to discover a huge spider on the wall right
> next to your hand never ceases to be an exciting one. Hence, many
> Huntsman deaths are listed under "heart failure".
> 
> Oh, and they *love* traveling by car, as this excellent video demonstrates
> (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCO56iyBXtU). Hence, most of
> the remaining Huntsman fatalities are recorded under "traffic accident".
> 
> ;-)
> 
> Damian