The Funnel-web Spider:
The Funnel-web Spider has always been the Jekyll and Hyde of Australian arachnids. It is very large, (though smaller than other Australian species) very ugly, highly venomous and sometimes aggressive. However, it also possesses one of the sweetest and most melodic singing voices of the entire insect kingdom and are generally jolly and good-natured when they’re not busy killing something.
It’s a real treat hearing them every Spring and Summer morning singing away joyfully from the tops of fences and roofs across suburbia, greeting the sun with their light-hearted tunes before scurrying away back to their cosy burrows. You can also often hear them warbling a merry little refrain to itself as it carries off someone’s cat or Schnauzer (its favourite treat) down into its lair.
It’s hard not to love them!
There are 40 different species of Funnel Web Spider such as the Bankstown Blue, Southern Fluffy, Melbourne Green Silky, the Royal Northern Tiger and the Red-banded Jumping Goliath as well as a wide variety of “boutique” hybrids like the Gorgeous Baboon and the very popular Springer Roughie and Hungry Mo to name but a few.
Most breeds can be domesticated after a fashion and the display hosted by the Australian Funnel Web Breeders Society at the Sydney Royal Easter Show is always well attended with the petting zoo being a popular Easter treat for kiddies of all ages. However, due to some unfortunate past experiences, the event is always scheduled so it doesn’t coincide with important dog, cat or reptile shows...
(Pic)
In this image we have Mrs Mary Pock of Narrabeen on Sydney’s beautiful Northern Beaches receiving the Grand Champion’s prize at the 2019 Australasian nationals with her famous purebred, Sydney Black, “Harold” named after her late husband.
Mrs Pock has also lost three cats and two dogs to her hobby but as she says with a twinkle in her eye, “Why just have two or four legs scuttling about the house when you can enjoy eight!”
From, "Australian Wildlife, the Shocking Truth!"
Available from Boolarong Press.
Robert Greenberg Everything in Australia will kill you! Whether it grows, swims, flies, crawls, slithers, hops or glides etc; it will either kill you, kill you then eat you, "violate" you or just settle for laying its eggs in your brain! LOOK INSIDE
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