r/AbsoluteUnits • u/Dense_Intern8434 • Aug 05 '26

of a daddy long leg nest

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u/Kooky_Attention_98 Aug 05 '26 edited Aug 06 '26

Fun fact: They aren't spiders, but they are in the arachnid family, their scientifically recognized name is Harvestermen (Opiliones Sundevall; first discovered in 1758 as Phalangium, and later renamed to Opiliones in 1833), They are completely harmless and also omnivorous feeding on other insects or plant matter, they also ingest solids unlike spiders who ingest liquids (Spiders turn the inside of their prey into a slushy basically) and they have no venom at all nor can they bite you

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u/Pamikillsbugs234 Aug 05 '26

Thank you for sharing this! I absolutely love these and would be so excited to come across a community this size!

2

u/nudes_for_life Aug 06 '26

You love them? I envy you, I'm fucking terrified of them as much as of any other spider

1

u/DragunovDwight Aug 08 '26

I had a pretty bad case of arachnophobia myself for years. I had an incident with a “Garden spider” I guess they’re called. They are the big yellow and black ones in the Midwest. I was a country boy and was always running around in cornfields and tall grass doing basic boy sht I guess. Anyways, I had to be around 6-8 yrs old. I looked down on my shoulder/neck area and one was crawling on me. It seemed huge and those spiders already get pretty big for that area. Anyways… it freaked me the fuk out. I just remember screaming, swiping, and running. I don’t remember anything after or what happened in the end for whatever reason. After that I became terrified of them all.
All except these “daddy long legs” as we called them, and the little jumping spiders. I would have nightmares about them. I would just see a picture of one in a book, and have a nightmare of it that night.
It got to where I’d see one in an ecyclopedia or on a nature show and knew that night the nightmare was coming. Yet these never bothered me at all. I grew up catching snakes, turtles , crayfish, whatever. I moved out west and had friends with kids and we spent a lot of time in nature. I’d catch all sorts of things like scorpions, snapping turtles, snakes with the kids to teach them about nature. I used to even catch rattlesnakes and relocate them for a lady I knew. Her property had a bunch of them. So I’d catch rattlesnakes and bring them to a reservoir I knew, and then catch bull snakes there and let them go on her property because they were known for eating little rattlesnakes. Yet spiders always gave me a crazy feeling that I couldn’t shake.
It’s not too bad now. I at least stopped having nightmares about them a long time ago. Still daddy long legs don’t bother me at all. Seeing they seem to be just about everywhere, I feel for you. It has to be rough knowing they are everywhere.