A large yellow spider that is not native to the United States has been discovered just south of North Carolina.
The orb-weaver spider is native to Korea, Taiwan, and China, but in 2013 scientists discovered it living in Georgia.
Their populations have been growing along parts of the South and East Coasts for years, and many researchers believe it's only a matter of time before they spread across much of the continental United States.
But spider experts say there's no need to worry too much.
“My sense is that people love strange, bizarre and potentially dangerous things,” said David Nelsen, a biology professor at Southern Adventist University who has studied the orb-weaver spider's range expansion. “This is the kind of thing that ticks all the boxes for mass hysteria.”
Instead, scientists are concerned about the rise of invasive species that can harm crops and trees, a problem exacerbated by global trade and climate change, which are making local environmental conditions more hospitable to pests that previously couldn't survive frigid winters.
Adult female dusky spiders can grow up to 3 inches in length. They can also fly (to some extent) by constructing a parachute in their web that they can use to catch the wind and travel more than 50 miles.
They are difficult to spot at this time of year because they are still early in their life cycle and are only about the size of a grain of rice, although adults are most commonly seen in August and September.
And yet, despite being an arachnophobe's worst nightmare, there have been zero reported human bites from the spider in the United States.
Experts say that while insecticides are effective at killing individual spiders, when one dies more of them are likely to move into the area.
Where are they heading?
Scientists are still trying to figure out why, said David Coyle, an assistant professor at Clemson University who worked with Nelsen on a study of the gnat's range published last November. The gnat's core population is mainly in Atlanta, but it spreads into the Carolinas and southeastern Tennessee. In the past two years, a satellite population has become established in Baltimore, Coyle said.
So when will the study result lead to the species becoming more prevalent in the Northeast? “It could be this year, it could be 10 years from now. We really don't know,” he said. “We probably won't get there in a year. We need to take incremental steps.”
Can they fly?
The larvae can — using a tactic known as “ballooning” — allow young spiders to use their webs to harness the Earth's winds and electromagnetic currents to travel relatively long distances, but fully grown spiders have never been seen taking flight.
What do they eat?
The spiders eat whatever falls into their webs, mostly insects, which means they may compete with native spiders for food, but that may not be all bad: The spiders they catch each day also become food for native birds, as personally documented by University of Georgia researcher Andy Davis.
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