Brown Recluse Spider
Posted on 11/17/2006 1:05:13 AM PST by Mrs Ivan
A man spent three days in hospital after being bitten by a venomous spider now spreading across the country because of global warming.
The false widow spider, a relative of the black widow, bit Jason Fricker, 34, three times on the chest and stomach after it fell down the front of his shirt a week ago. By Sunday, after treatment as an outpatient the previous day, Mr Fricker, a father of two from Dorchester, was admitted as an emergency by doctors who believed the venom was attacking his nervous system, causing a heart attack.
The creature that caused such damage, Steatoda nobilis, is the only species of spider in Britain capable of biting humans. Although it has been known in Britain since arriving in Torquay in bananas from the Canary Islands in the 1870s, its numbers and range are now growing because of the milder climates.
While it is not nearly as venomous as the black widow, in recent years it has spread from the West Country across southern England as far as Sussex and is now migrating north through Surrey.
Stuart Hine, the manager of insect services at the Natural History Museum, said: "It is moving further northwards and is thought to be in London now. That's to do with the general warming up of winter temperatures because they are able to survive the winter and breed.
"All spiders are venomous but the difference with these false widow spiders is that their fangs can pierce the skin. Global warming means that spiders which originate from southern Europe and North Africa and Asia are now more likely to be able to survive in Britain."
Mr Fricker, who runs a fishery and tackle shop, discovered he had been bitten as he set out his angling goods on his stall at the market.
"I was carrying the goods in a cardboard box when I think the spider must have come out of the corner of the box and went down my front," he said yesterday. "Five minutes later, I felt this sort of burning sensation on my chest like a wasp sting.
"I shook my jumper and the spider fell down on to my stomach. Then it must have bitten me again and I saw this spider fall to the floor and scuttle off into the centre of Salisbury."
Mr Fricker thought nothing of it until the next day when he started to feel unwell. His wife Katie, 30, spotted the bites. "When the doctor saw the puncture wounds he got all excited and said: 'You are the first person in my career I have seen who has been bitten by a spider. There is no doubt about this'."
After identifying the spider as a false widow on a hospital computer, he was sent home with anti-histamine tablets. But the next day, his condition deteriorated. "I thought I was having a heart attack. The pain in my chest was excruciating," he said. "I seriously thought I was going to die, it was that bad."
Mr Fricker was admitted to Dorchester County Hospital where doctors believed he might be having a heart seizure caused by an extreme reaction to the bite.
"I was wired up on drips and was given heart drugs. I spent three days in hospital for being bitten by something I hadn't even heard of," he said.
Mr Fricker, who has a son Ryan, nine, and daughter Charlotte, two, was released from hospital on Tuesday and is convalescing at home.
Doctors say that, in the vast majority of cases, the spider's bite should be no more painful, and the medical consequences no more serious, than a wasp sting.
Yesterday I had a hangnail because of global warming.
Glo-bull warming truly is the cause of all ills. Not.
You can't make this stuff up!
I'm quite sure that it was global warming that caused me to lose my house keys last week.
LOL
Do you mean omens? Are you a seer?
Lucky you. Here in Texas, if it walks, crawls or flys, it's probably poisonous!
:-)
OUCH!!!
I hate spiders....... we have tarantulas and other critters here including the brown recluse which I haven't seen..thankfully!!
The tarantulas are ugly as heck but usually will back off if you scare them!!
A man spent three days in hospital after being bitten by a venomous spider now spreading across the country because of global warming.
Prove it
NOtice that the doctor commented that this was the first time he had seen it.
The false widow spider, a relative of the black widow, bit Jason Fricker, 34, three times on the chest and stomach after it fell down the front of his shirt a week ago
I was shopping a couple of years ago at a store way up in the U.P. and a lady came up behind me and said I better be checking those bananas very carefully, her sister had taken home a big spider the week before in her bananas from that very store! I dropped my bananas and jumped back! Ever since, I have been parking far away from the banana racks and checking over my fruit really carefully. The bananas, I mean.
ping
How about George Galloway?
I would run screaming from the room if I saw one of those.
I'll take a black widow bite over a recluse any day.
We need more mantids. Spiders suck!
The stories that people have been telling about their experiences with those things are totally gruesome.
I'm so used to bugs, I don't give them a second thought.....I have Weaver Spiders all over my yard and porch....
Believe me, when I see wasps in their webs, I thank the ole girls :)
Spiders are really the things that make me shudder - especially when the legs are all spindly and out of proportion to the body - the tiny ones I don't mind.
I think the laundry spiders (as I call them) did a great job keeping the bitey flying insects out of the house this summer, but ewwww, they still scare me.
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