A few days ago my husband came into the living room to startle my grandkids and me with a terrifying tale. He had been out moving some bricks along the walkway(he the champion of salvaged bricks!) and after turning one over confronted the largest spider he had ever seen. Putting the brick back down, he went on gardening. Suddenly the spider leaped(literally) onto his hand, ran(literally) up his arm and around to the back of his neck. He was able to shake it off before it could think about biting him.
Listening to his account, my grandkids immediately yelled in unison WOLF SPIDER and began to squeal, shriek and generally show their terror/delight at the encounter. They had spoken about wolf spiders to me before, but I had dismissed the discussion as exaggeration on their part. After a family search of Google, we determined that it was indeed a wolf spider. They don’t spin but catch their prey by running and jumping onto it. The sting apparently is dangerous only to the elderly and children(thus a threat to all of us reading the information.)
These creatures have eight eyes, hairy skins, two extra legs in from by their mouth and a face that does indeed resemble a wolf. The kids really wanted to see one and really didn’t want to see one, proving more ambivalent than I am. I had no idea that such menaces lived in our back yard and have no desire to encounter one myself. I had lived blissfully ignorant that running, jumping spiders lived in Connecticut. It will be hard to return to my happy oblivion!
Saved By Words 
Yikes! I’m not normally afraid of spiders, but that sounds terrifying, especially as I have a compromised immune system……
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He was scared and very little ever scares him.
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I can imagine…
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Maybe you need a Woodsman spider to deal with it?
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Good one!
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Can be scary!
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I have had one in my basement CHASE ME DOWN even with me spraying spider spray. They are huge and aggressive. Thank God it didnt land in my arm.
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OMG. Another blogger from Alabama has also seen many.
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They are NO JOKE
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Yikes! It’s hard to ‘like’ this post! 😯
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I hear you.
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They were abundant where we lived before. Only had one venture in the house, in our 8 years there.
At night, you could shine a flashlight out into the yard and see blue and purple twinkling points of light. Those wolf spiders can make you hurt yourself, when they run at you. Glad that he avoided a bite.
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Yikes. One was one too many for us.
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I didn’t know such a spider existed and hope I never ever see one.
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I really thought they were an urban(or rural)legend when the kids told me about them.
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I think I’ll stay inside.
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Good plan.
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Oh, that’s scary!
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I am reminded of the most memorable weather report I have heard. The weatherman wanted to save tarantulas. He pulled one out of a small cage to demonstrate that they are harmless. It then crawled up his arm and into his back. The other terrorized newscasters would not come to his aid. He then pulled his jacket off, removed the errant beast and proceeded with the weather.
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What poise under pressure.
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One reason to be grateful for living in the UK. We have no such spiders.
Your husband was kind. I would have brought the brick back down on the little monster immediately, and squashed it without hesitation!
When I was around 11 years old, I wrote a story/essay at school about the fact that if spiders were as big as cats, and ants were as big as mice, they would kill all the humans. 🙂
Best wishes, Pete.
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Don’t ever watch the Harry Potter movie with an even larger spider.
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My goodness, Elizabeth, it is dangerous in your neck of the woods at the moment. Spiders, tornadoes… I hope that’s an end to such unusual and nasty surprises!
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Well, sadly no. Check today’s post.
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