CLOSED: Help with Spider ID

Hi there, keep finding these guys around my house... one on the wall next to my bed. Found three of them hiding in the shower curtain.

I live on the south shore of Lake Tahoe, we have snow on the ground, it's cold and somewhat wet. Didn't think the spiders would be an issue already.

They are about 2-3 inches large (pretty big!). Orange/brown/maroon legs; darker body & abdomen.

The two little balls look like antenna, although my girlfriend is convinced these are venomous balls of impending doom. As a result, I have to find out what this spider is.

Sorry for the poor pic quality, snapped with with my cell phone before... well... you know.

Thank you in advance for your help... I would very much like my girlfriend to visit my home again. :-)

Other than telling you that it's a male spider (those swellings are its pedipalps, used in sperm transfer during mating) and it's not a dangerous (to humans, anyway) species, the image is too fuzzy to say much more. You might check out some of the California spiders at http://tinyurl.com/cjcxds to see if anything looks close.

Very few spiders in North America reach that size. Off the top of my head I only know of Tarantulas (which it's not), common "garden spider" (again not), and wolf spiders (which it might be). None of them are particularly dangerous or aggressive. Wolf spiders are found pretty much everywhere on the planet except maybe antarctica and the north pole so you might want to use your favorite search engine and take a look at some wolf spiders online.

This message was edited Mar 25, 2009 2:40 AM

This message was edited Mar 25, 2009 2:42 AM

This is him!!

Anachemmis spp.and Titiotus spp.

So.... is it dangerous? Could they been driven in my house by the cold? And why so many of them? Should I call a witch doctor... or the Orkin man?

THANKS FOR YOUR HELP!!! :-)

This is a small family of spiders, of which very little seems to be known - see http://tinyurl.com/d8bh4y
As you seem to have quite a colony, you might try contacting the Department of Entomology at the University of California, Riverside (general info: 951- 827-5294; insect identification requests email: insectidinquiries@ucr.edu), to see if anyone there would be interested in looking at them. They really don't seem to be anything to worry about from a human health standpoint.

Better wait for suunto since clearly he or she loves spiders more than I, however yes spiders will come inside to avoid the cold. Also it's probably a 1" spider at best. I don't know if it's dangerous, most spiders generally aren't but call Orkin or get a chicken if you're concerned.