Had a visitor to the mill today

[weaver]

Had this little fella wander in as I was trying to work out my next cut.
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[Opelblues2]

chasing a feed some where, ants. great photo thanks

[RedShirtGuy]

Aww...super cute. I had one turn up on my bush block one day...never to be seen again in 7 years. Previously I'd only ever dodged the waddling buggers on the road, so the close up experience was wonderful.


No doubt a lot of us have seen other critters when cutting up logs before (eg: swarms of freakin' Huntsmen spiders), but how many of us have cut through a log, into a hollow, and thought "trees aren't fluffy on the inside!?" before you realised you've almost Ginsu'd a couple of possums

[weaver]

I did my honours thesis on the "Behavioural Ecology of the Social Huntsman Spider Delena cancerides".

Biggest nest I ever found had 355 huntsman in it.

[RedShirtGuy]

I woulda pooped

[weaver]

I collected a lot of spiders. From memory it was around 15000 spiders each caught, measured and weighed.

The scariest time was not a Delena but a Isopoda Vasta.

I. vasta is the biggest huntsman in Australia. My supervisor and I were chasing this one up a tree when it jumped off the tree 1.5m onto my chest. Needless to say I freaked out.

[RedShirtGuy]

I was a massive aracnaphobe until I did the Museum of Victoria's Spiders web site. When I started the job I would feel ill and get dizzy just looking at the photos of each critter. But as I added the text, I read it, and realised that mostly my fear was a primeval one of "EIGHT LEGS GOING FAST AND COMING RIGHT FOR ME!!!" and not that they were all poisonous killers.

I'm not entirely cured, but I don't need to wear brown pants when I'm sawing anymore...unless one of the buggers gets on my shoulder or up on the inside of my helmet visor...then it's all on for the Olympic Spinning Chainsaw Toss and 400 meter squelchy-undies dash

[artme]

Nothing quite as spine chilling as being held in a half Nelson by a bloody great huntsman!!

[Willy Nelson]

Aww...super cute. I had one turn up on my bush block one day...never to be seen again in 7 years. Previously I'd only ever dodged the waddling buggers on the road, so the close up experience was wonderful.


No doubt a lot of us have seen other critters when cutting up logs before (eg: swarms of freakin' Huntsmen spiders), but how many of us have cut through a log, into a hollow, and thought "trees aren't fluffy on the inside!?" before you realised you've almost Ginsu'd a couple of possums

Or noticing a heap of sap leaking from a freshly to realise a snake was cut into 30 cm long lengths

[Willy Nelson]

Nothing quite as spine chilling as being held in a half Nelson by a bloody great huntsman!!

Yes there, being in a Full NELSON, by a Nelson
Willy Nelson
Jarrahland

[dai sensei]

Great shots Weaver, love those little critters

As for spiders , your girls orta try a Bird Eating spider, like a huntsman on steroids . I had one fall in my pool in Darwin, thought it was dead and tried removing it with the net, then it woke up and ran up the handle

[Mobyturns]

Great shots Weaver, love those little critters

As for spiders , your girls orta try a Bird Eating spider, like a huntsman on steroids . I had one fall in my pool in Darwin, thought it was dead and tried removing it with the net, then it woke up and ran up the handle

Wait till you walk into one in the scrub! Found plenty of them in my travels in the bush surveying. Probably have some photos of them from the 1980's when I used to come in contact with them a fair bit. Found some big ones along the railway line near Forsayth. Most probably Giant Golden Orb-weaver (Nephila pilipes)

[pjt]

I spent two weeks on Kangaroo Island radio tracking individual echidnas, they generally keep to themselves within their own home range and do the burrowing thing when disturbed.
Don't like to see them in zoos or flat on the road and I don't mind having hunstmans about the place here either



Pete

[rob streeper]

I woulda pooped

I found this pretty girl hanging around a while back. About 100 mm front to back leg spread. Fortunately these are benign, for humans that is.


golden orbweaver.jpg

[rosewood]

Knocked down an old Yellow Box for a mate years ago and about to packup when i saw the poor old goanna pinned under a branch. It wasn't his fault i had cut the tree down so thought had better do the right thing and save him. Crawled in amongst the branches , cut the billet either side of him and rolled it back off him. Thats when i found out why he was up the tree in the first place, the sky went black with bees. The 120 was still idling away on the ground which was upsetting them no end and they were swarming all over it. Managed to "SLOWLY" reach down and turn it off which calmed them down a bit and crept back out without being stung(don't know how).
Old mate the goanna was not injured and casually wandered off without so much as a thank you.

Ungrateful excuse for an oversize lizard!!