CAUGHT ON CAMERA: Tarantuloid spiders rare sight in Kamloops, Okanagan
Tarantuloid spiders never cease to fright and delight when spotted, because of their tarantula-like body and large size. Six species of the spiders live in B.C. but they're not often noticed because they burrow in the ground. Usually males will only be seen out and about during mating...
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Tarantuloid spiders never cease to fright and delight when spotted, because of their tarantula-like body and large size.
Six species of the spiders live in B.C. but they're not often noticed because they burrow in the ground. Usually males will only be seen out and about during mating season.
Kamloops resident Nancy Donnithorne saw a tarantuloid spider for her first time late in the evening, April 21.
“It was outdoors on my stucco wall, twice the size of a toonie,” she said. “This isn't your typical garden spider. I hope it finds its mate away from my house."
She snapped a photo of the spider and shared it on social media.
“I don’t have any knowledge of these critters, just experiencing them as they come along,” Donnithorne said. “A few people that posted on my thread had some good information on them. It is pretty cool how B.C. and Kamloops are hosts to many different and interesting creatures.”
Though far smaller than their large, hairy tarantula cousins in other parts of the world, tarantuloids play an important ecological role in our environment, primarily through insect control.
READ MORE: Move over black widows, you aren’t the scariest looking spider in the Interior
Dr. Robb Bennett is a research associate with the Royal B.C. Museum who is passionate about studying spiders.
In a previous iNFOnews article he said the sightings of tarantuloids are extremely rare because they like to burrow and they have a narrow range of where they like to live.
“We don’t see them very often," Bennett said. "Kamloops itself is a really interesting location just because of the confluence of the two Thompsons, but it's about as far north as you get to the dry belt, sagebrush, black widow spiders and that sort of thing. I wouldn’t have expected that (species) that far north.”
The spiders have been found in the Okanagan and further south in Washington state and Oregon.
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