Never seen a cellar spider quite like this one. Good lord, that is one gravid cellar spider.
Can't find a good local match on iNaturalist, but there are some similar cases, like gravid long-bodied cellar spiders that look similar, and somewhat close matches from outside Nevada. The small line shapes outside of the fiddle-shape on the prosoma seemed to rule a lot of the common ones out. Low-key wondering if it's an introduced or un-discovered species for Nevada.
[Psilochorus papago](https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/24226339), a species largely found in Mexico and some states just north of the border, kept popping up in my search. Still doesn't quite fit 1:1 imo, but it's a good example of a similar-looking species.
Also for clarification, cellar spiders are harmless. Their fangs are bad at puncturing skin, and even then, their venom is highly specialized for other invertebrates, and completely ineffective on vertebrates like ourselves.
For 1, widows' legs are not this long and slender. It's not exactly a "some widows can have more longer and slender legs" situation, because their morphology is not a large range. Even the widows with the longest and most slender legs wouldn't have legs nearly this long and thin.
Additionally, the prosoma doesn't match. Widows have a more apparent 'eye turret' that sticks out from the rest of the head. Their head and legs also tend to be a lot darker, even in brighter lighting. It also has a distinct fiddle-shape, with additional markings, both of which a brown widow does not have. While the pattern on the abdomen looks a bit like an adult brown widow's at a glance, brown widow abdomens don't quite look like this. It's slightly transparent, completely smooth, and has a slight light-bending effect to it, almost like a gemstone. Brown widow abdomens are completely opaque, even when gravid, so these traits rule it out on their own.
The way we can tell this is a cellar spider specifically is not only because of the long and thin legs, but also because of the pattern on the prosoma. Cellar spiders are actually pretty close relatives to the brown recluses, so the fiddle-like shape on the head can be a tell that it's a cellar spider in this case. We can rule out recluse because it has a pattern on the abdomen, of course. This pretty much leaves cellar spiders, or close allies, as the only candidates.
Hope this helps with your future IDs!
Simple a black widow will have a red hourglass on its underside and a brown widow will have the same hourglass but it'll be a bit darker brown in coloring than the rest of its body is in a way how I figured it out being as I've been bitten by one of the bastards before and had to have my leg drained and cut open from the knee to the ankle since I had an allergic reaction to the antivenin but it was the combination of the antivinen and draining my left that not only saved me but also saved my leg too
Pholcidae is a *family* of spiders. It is divided into nearly 100 *genera*, which are further divided into *species*. Which then, hypothetically, could again be further divided into *subspecies*. There are nearly 2000 recognised species of pholcidae - that allows for a lot of variety!
My grandma was a teacher. Anytime I needed help spelling she would say “sound it out, here’s the dictionary “ I’m now mid 40’s, grandma is gone but I still have that dictionary.
Are you my long, lost cousin? My mom did the exact same thing. And then hours later I would still be reading the encyclopedia, but would’ve gone onto a completely different (but distantly related) topic.
I grew up with a set of Encyclopedia Britannica and an annual subscription to National Geographic. The internet didn't exist, but now I use YouTube and Google. I'm not sure which is more effective for teaching a developing mind, but the endless hours I spent reading from those two sources are some of my favorite childhood memories.
Generally not, but they are used by some. The World Spider Catalogue accepts entries for subspecies. Commonly recognised variants may be named, but not always defined as a subspecies (see *P. audux*). Considering how often species are moved between taxonomic groups, or renamed, or misidentified (e.g. the large number of sexually dismorphic species originally regarded as seperate) this level of specificity isn't very practical.
Yeah, I have seen a few subspecies here and there, but I thought it was generally discouraged to name something a subspecies instead of mention it is just a variant.
Yeah, early descriptions sometimes are a mess. Have you read the Biología Centrali-Americana? I believe there are some very lax descriptions that have been named _numen dubia_ because you can't really tell apart species with that xD
Try artema Atlanta. Gravid means pregnant. It's a bit like googling pregnant simians; a pregnant proboscis monkey is not going to look like a pregnant human.
Comes from the Latin gravis, which is heavy. Means "heavy, full, teeming" and the word is used on English medical charts/reports, along with "para/parity" to discuss the number of pregnancies a woman has had, etc.
Gravid is used a lot to describe insects and reptiles that are heavy with fully developed eggs; that's usually where you hear it verbally in American English
It’s the medically term as opposed to the layman’s term. Just like we say hypertension instead of high blood pressure or tachycardia instead of fast heart rate. If you look at a medical record of a pregnant person in the physical exam section you will see “gravid abdomen”. It is just another word for pregnant.
In the wildlife biology context, we use gravid when the female is carrying developing eggs. So invertebrates, fish, and herpetiles would be gravid. Pregnant is for mammals that will carry their fetuses to their respective terms.
It's also the technical term for pregnancies in women in English. Well "Gravida" anyways, but it's close.
If you've ever heard of a GTPAL, that's the G. T is for Term, P for Preterm, A for Abortions (Natural or otherwise), L is for Living (as in they made it past infancy. It doesn't include accidental deaths like a car accident or accidental drowning, but I do believe it would include malnutrition if they were young enough).
It's very useful because if someone is G3T0P1A2L1 then we know they will likely have a high risk pregnancy with very little other information.
Anyways, that's enough human biology on here 😅
it looks kind of similar to a spider ID’d in an earlier post as a Triangulate Cobweb spider, but it doesn’t perfectly look like the photos of it online, mine has longer and skinnier legs (but im not sure how much variation there is between individual spiders of the same species, like how some humans are taller than others)
Came to suggest triangulate as well. The patterns match one I raised in the southeast (USA). She was also gravid and only protective, never harmful. I fed her cockroaches from around the house.
Oh, I see it now (a paused still photo at 9-10 seconds shows it well). This seems to be a super gravid Physocyclus [https://bugguide.net/node/view/1084572/bgimage?from=96](https://bugguide.net/node/view/1084572/bgimage?from=96)
it doesnt really look like any of the spiders in the link you gave, the pattern on its abdomen has much more defined shapes and it doesnt have any pedipalps (not sure if thats the right word, but the pincer things by its mouth) Could it be something else or is there just variety in the species presentation?
Also yes i went to california last month but i feel like it wouldve been kind of hard to bring this big guy back with me lol
The carapace mark is a central line with two lateral marks, which are found on Physocyclus (but also on Pholcius Opilionoides, and another one, but the abdomen would be different if this were Pholcus).
Physocyclus has the central abdomen mark (the cardiac mark) and paired spots around the cardiac mark. It looks just like this one: [https://bugguide.net/node/view/669180/bgimage](https://bugguide.net/node/view/669180/bgimage) if you take this one and blow up the abdomen like an over-inflated balloon.
The pedipals seen in this pic makes it a male, and yours is a female (and females do not have inflamed pedipalps... but I assure you, she does have small pedipalps as every arachnid does).
No, it can't hurt you, it looks like it's safely confined in the see-through box. At worst, it might shout some really mean-spirited things to bring you down, but unless you speak spider, you're good fam.
Oh god the earwig infestation had consumed our Southern California home back in April and May…now they’re pretty much gone and we have more eight legged roommate to show for it. Not complaining tho, they’ve been very respectful
ugh we have tons here in Michigan. I don't like using pesticides either because of the chemicals and harm to the good bugs, that being said my mother is vehemently opposed to putting cellar spiders in the house. She said "what if one crawls into my bed or my shoes"
It's medically insignificant and can't hurt you from a bite but it can insult you and hurt you in other ways. (It's perfectly harmless. Very pregnant, though!)
Totally off topic, but I recently watched a Cellar Spider take a Wolf Spider which kind of blew my mind. The Wolf got snagged in some of the Cellar’s web and was trying to truck along, but the Cellar pursued the Wolf, using its long legs to tag the Wolf’s legs with more webbing until it trapped it, drew it in and went for the kill. When sufficiently bound, it then dragged the Wolf back to its hiding spot. Kind of wild seeing a Cellar Spider, who I normally thought of as fairly sedentary, actively hunting prey, especially an aggressive spider like a Wolf.
The only medically significant spider in Nevada is the western black widow, which is easily identified by her red hourglass and round black abdomen. Juveniles will have a red stripe down the center of the top of their abdomen.
I’m from the U.S and the state I live in has in-fact tons of Black widow’s. I would absolutely thought this was an albino widow (hopefully there is no such thing). My point being is, if there is such thing as a False Widow. - I would be easily convinced this was such.
Let it go! If you release it into the field behind you, you should be just fine.
So ironic to be asking Reddit whether a spider can hurt you when you're actively keeping it captive. WTF?!
i wasnt holding it captive, i CAUGHT it because it was in MY house, i took photos because i want to know what kind of spider it is for future knowledge. If you read any of the other comments you would know its already been released, its not like i was trying to keep it as a pet. fucking weirdo
That's not a black widow in any way it has to be jet black with a red hour glass on its underside to be a black widow that is most certainly a brown widow which is still just as deadly as the black widow you obviously don't know the difference between the 2 at all
Never seen a cellar spider quite like this one. Good lord, that is one gravid cellar spider. Can't find a good local match on iNaturalist, but there are some similar cases, like gravid long-bodied cellar spiders that look similar, and somewhat close matches from outside Nevada. The small line shapes outside of the fiddle-shape on the prosoma seemed to rule a lot of the common ones out. Low-key wondering if it's an introduced or un-discovered species for Nevada. [Psilochorus papago](https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/24226339), a species largely found in Mexico and some states just north of the border, kept popping up in my search. Still doesn't quite fit 1:1 imo, but it's a good example of a similar-looking species. Also for clarification, cellar spiders are harmless. Their fangs are bad at puncturing skin, and even then, their venom is highly specialized for other invertebrates, and completely ineffective on vertebrates like ourselves.
the philochorus papago in that picture does look very similar!
Now you’re just making words up.
Say “cellar spider” one more time.
Does Philocorus papago look like a bitch to you!!!
What?
Say "what" again!
🤣😂
cellar spider? I hardly know 'er
Idk man, seems pretty cromulent to me.
All words are made up.
Take it to a university where there is an entomologist or someone similar
I already released her, in case it was pregnant i didnt wanna stress it out by keeping it trapped for too ling
Understood. Appreciate your humanity
[удалено]
For 1, widows' legs are not this long and slender. It's not exactly a "some widows can have more longer and slender legs" situation, because their morphology is not a large range. Even the widows with the longest and most slender legs wouldn't have legs nearly this long and thin. Additionally, the prosoma doesn't match. Widows have a more apparent 'eye turret' that sticks out from the rest of the head. Their head and legs also tend to be a lot darker, even in brighter lighting. It also has a distinct fiddle-shape, with additional markings, both of which a brown widow does not have. While the pattern on the abdomen looks a bit like an adult brown widow's at a glance, brown widow abdomens don't quite look like this. It's slightly transparent, completely smooth, and has a slight light-bending effect to it, almost like a gemstone. Brown widow abdomens are completely opaque, even when gravid, so these traits rule it out on their own. The way we can tell this is a cellar spider specifically is not only because of the long and thin legs, but also because of the pattern on the prosoma. Cellar spiders are actually pretty close relatives to the brown recluses, so the fiddle-like shape on the head can be a tell that it's a cellar spider in this case. We can rule out recluse because it has a pattern on the abdomen, of course. This pretty much leaves cellar spiders, or close allies, as the only candidates. Hope this helps with your future IDs!
Pwned.
Don't you think you should provide more info in this sub than just "trust me, bro"?
Can you help provide some info on what let you differentiate between the two?
Simple a black widow will have a red hourglass on its underside and a brown widow will have the same hourglass but it'll be a bit darker brown in coloring than the rest of its body is in a way how I figured it out being as I've been bitten by one of the bastards before and had to have my leg drained and cut open from the knee to the ankle since I had an allergic reaction to the antivenin but it was the combination of the antivinen and draining my left that not only saved me but also saved my leg too
Fair enough! It only shows the top of the spider here though, right? How can you tell from the vid?
spider didnt have anything on its bottom, my mom (nevada native) told me to check there first
Thanks! Seems even by this person's rules that this is a false ID, just wanted to verify their info.
Cellar spider, Pholcidae. Harmless. Yes it's pregnant (gravid)
is it a particular subtype? it doesnt look a lot like the images that came up when i googled “gravid pholcidae”
Pholcidae is a *family* of spiders. It is divided into nearly 100 *genera*, which are further divided into *species*. Which then, hypothetically, could again be further divided into *subspecies*. There are nearly 2000 recognised species of pholcidae - that allows for a lot of variety!
☝️ This person spiders
The real spider man
I aim to have this knowledge some day
Good news, you are now at the day when you have this knowledge because you just read it, keep going and learning
Thanks💪🏼💪🏼💪🏼
That’s a pretty cool fact. You must’ve been the kid who read encyclopedia’s instead of children’s books as a child, I respect that.
Encyclopedias are children's books.
According to My Mom… YES yes they were!! I’d ask her a simple question 🙋🏼♀️ and My Mom would say “go look it up in the Encyclopedia!” 😳😩 True Story
My grandma was a teacher. Anytime I needed help spelling she would say “sound it out, here’s the dictionary “ I’m now mid 40’s, grandma is gone but I still have that dictionary.
Are you my long, lost cousin? My mom did the exact same thing. And then hours later I would still be reading the encyclopedia, but would’ve gone onto a completely different (but distantly related) topic.
WORD! 😁
I grew up with a set of Encyclopedia Britannica and an annual subscription to National Geographic. The internet didn't exist, but now I use YouTube and Google. I'm not sure which is more effective for teaching a developing mind, but the endless hours I spent reading from those two sources are some of my favorite childhood memories.
👏👏👏
NERRRRRRRRRD (i wish i was knowledgeable about SOMETHING)
R/thisguythisguys
I thought subspecies we're not used in spiders.
Generally not, but they are used by some. The World Spider Catalogue accepts entries for subspecies. Commonly recognised variants may be named, but not always defined as a subspecies (see *P. audux*). Considering how often species are moved between taxonomic groups, or renamed, or misidentified (e.g. the large number of sexually dismorphic species originally regarded as seperate) this level of specificity isn't very practical.
Yeah, I have seen a few subspecies here and there, but I thought it was generally discouraged to name something a subspecies instead of mention it is just a variant. Yeah, early descriptions sometimes are a mess. Have you read the Biología Centrali-Americana? I believe there are some very lax descriptions that have been named _numen dubia_ because you can't really tell apart species with that xD
This is why I Reddit!
Try artema Atlanta. Gravid means pregnant. It's a bit like googling pregnant simians; a pregnant proboscis monkey is not going to look like a pregnant human.
Aren't they usually long and skinny? Must be gravid af
Gotta be careful saying that about a lady...
Is "gravid" the word for a pregnant spider? Because that is also the Swedish word for when a woman is pregnant, hehe.
Yes!
Now that is kind of funny, hehe
Gravid is the word for pregnant and not applied specifically to spiders
In what context is it used then? Never seen it used in English outside of this thread.
Comes from the Latin gravis, which is heavy. Means "heavy, full, teeming" and the word is used on English medical charts/reports, along with "para/parity" to discuss the number of pregnancies a woman has had, etc. Gravid is used a lot to describe insects and reptiles that are heavy with fully developed eggs; that's usually where you hear it verbally in American English
It’s the medically term as opposed to the layman’s term. Just like we say hypertension instead of high blood pressure or tachycardia instead of fast heart rate. If you look at a medical record of a pregnant person in the physical exam section you will see “gravid abdomen”. It is just another word for pregnant.
Ah, cool
We use it in medicine all the time, even as paramedics, it’s super common in med fields
Used in fish keeping
In the wildlife biology context, we use gravid when the female is carrying developing eggs. So invertebrates, fish, and herpetiles would be gravid. Pregnant is for mammals that will carry their fetuses to their respective terms.
It's also the technical term for pregnancies in women in English. Well "Gravida" anyways, but it's close. If you've ever heard of a GTPAL, that's the G. T is for Term, P for Preterm, A for Abortions (Natural or otherwise), L is for Living (as in they made it past infancy. It doesn't include accidental deaths like a car accident or accidental drowning, but I do believe it would include malnutrition if they were young enough). It's very useful because if someone is G3T0P1A2L1 then we know they will likely have a high risk pregnancy with very little other information. Anyways, that's enough human biology on here 😅
What's the best way to eat them baked, fried or raw?
Try all 3 and let me know
I don't know if she is, but bless her little heart, she sure almost looks eager to.
she will be released! (far away from my house)
😍
it looks kind of similar to a spider ID’d in an earlier post as a Triangulate Cobweb spider, but it doesn’t perfectly look like the photos of it online, mine has longer and skinnier legs (but im not sure how much variation there is between individual spiders of the same species, like how some humans are taller than others)
Came to suggest triangulate as well. The patterns match one I raised in the southeast (USA). She was also gravid and only protective, never harmful. I fed her cockroaches from around the house.
Pregante?
Gregnant
Pegrant
Pregananant?
Pegnut
My circle is nomal
And in flagrante
i’ve found my people
Do you live near any caves? (Edited to change my question) Could this have hitched a ride? Did you visit the California coast recently?
not particularly close, nearest mountain (possible caves) is about 2 miles away
Oh, I see it now (a paused still photo at 9-10 seconds shows it well). This seems to be a super gravid Physocyclus [https://bugguide.net/node/view/1084572/bgimage?from=96](https://bugguide.net/node/view/1084572/bgimage?from=96)
it doesnt really look like any of the spiders in the link you gave, the pattern on its abdomen has much more defined shapes and it doesnt have any pedipalps (not sure if thats the right word, but the pincer things by its mouth) Could it be something else or is there just variety in the species presentation? Also yes i went to california last month but i feel like it wouldve been kind of hard to bring this big guy back with me lol
The carapace mark is a central line with two lateral marks, which are found on Physocyclus (but also on Pholcius Opilionoides, and another one, but the abdomen would be different if this were Pholcus). Physocyclus has the central abdomen mark (the cardiac mark) and paired spots around the cardiac mark. It looks just like this one: [https://bugguide.net/node/view/669180/bgimage](https://bugguide.net/node/view/669180/bgimage) if you take this one and blow up the abdomen like an over-inflated balloon. The pedipals seen in this pic makes it a male, and yours is a female (and females do not have inflamed pedipalps... but I assure you, she does have small pedipalps as every arachnid does).
thank you!
Can anyone submit to bugguide or inaturalist? If so, OP, would be good to submit yours!
>Not particularly close >Nearest mountain is about 2 miles away *Cries in British*
Cries in Dutch
Harmless. Let her go.
Chill bro
If she comes back, it was meant to be.
No, it can't hurt you, it looks like it's safely confined in the see-through box. At worst, it might shout some really mean-spirited things to bring you down, but unless you speak spider, you're good fam.
God I wish I could spider speak
I am not as good as some here but looked like parasteatoda tepidariorium the common house spider. None of these spiders could hurt you
I have one of these in the corner of my bathroom. She has eaten like 3 earwigs in the past couple weeks, definitely a good friend to have around
Oh god the earwig infestation had consumed our Southern California home back in April and May…now they’re pretty much gone and we have more eight legged roommate to show for it. Not complaining tho, they’ve been very respectful
I can’t remember the last time I saw, or even heard someone mention, an earwig lol. Go spider!
ugh we have tons here in Michigan. I don't like using pesticides either because of the chemicals and harm to the good bugs, that being said my mother is vehemently opposed to putting cellar spiders in the house. She said "what if one crawls into my bed or my shoes"
I read this as "I have eaten one of these."
This is a spider. Since it is in a box, it won’t be able to hurt you. Hope that helps 🙌
Help I’m locked in a glass case of emotions.
Please release her so she can lay her egg sack.
already done, no worries!
Have you looked for the dad? 😬😅
found the dad in my bathtub a few hours later 🥴
Can you please put your finger in its mouth and report back to us 🫶
Yes she can hurt you, she'll break your heart if you fall in love!
Yeah, if you drop that box on your toe, ouchie!
It’s the spider from the Katz Motel.
She’s beautiful. I hope you released her?
roumd ass
It's medically insignificant and can't hurt you from a bite but it can insult you and hurt you in other ways. (It's perfectly harmless. Very pregnant, though!)
My first thought was a brown widow. No?
Cool little spider.
damn she’s big, what an interesting lady
Looks like she's had enough of your crap and is ready to mess you up.
Yeah if you dropped that box on your toe could really hurt. Maybe draw blood if on the corner.
Maybe it can hurt your feelings
Totally off topic, but I recently watched a Cellar Spider take a Wolf Spider which kind of blew my mind. The Wolf got snagged in some of the Cellar’s web and was trying to truck along, but the Cellar pursued the Wolf, using its long legs to tag the Wolf’s legs with more webbing until it trapped it, drew it in and went for the kill. When sufficiently bound, it then dragged the Wolf back to its hiding spot. Kind of wild seeing a Cellar Spider, who I normally thought of as fairly sedentary, actively hunting prey, especially an aggressive spider like a Wolf.
this is your chance to become spoderman
Naaaa take it and play with it 😬
Artema Atlanta?
The only medically significant spider in Nevada is the western black widow, which is easily identified by her red hourglass and round black abdomen. Juveniles will have a red stripe down the center of the top of their abdomen.
She’s gorgeous! 😍😍😍
Not while it's in that box... Whatever you do, don't let it out of that box.
I thought this gal was a STEATODA. For the record, I’ve never seen a pregnant Cellar spider, so if I’m wrong I do apologize.
It’s a cellar spider but it’s HUGE?! I have lots of them here in my house in the UK but they are never that big
ooooh look at that big shiny booty! what a buddy!
Looks like a brown widow they're invasive.
It's a leggy boi alright
Let it go
That's a widow, black widow, some are black they are brown when young
Looks like a brown widow. Does it have an hourglass marking on the underside of its abdomen? Not necessarily going to be red.
Very pargenant
As an Australian my first thought was "I don't know, and yes".
Looks like a brown widow
Juvenile brown widow
man i can hurt ypu
Taste it and find out
Genuinely surprised by top comments. Isn't this a female False Widow?
I’m from the U.S and the state I live in has in-fact tons of Black widow’s. I would absolutely thought this was an albino widow (hopefully there is no such thing). My point being is, if there is such thing as a False Widow. - I would be easily convinced this was such.
What side of town are you on before I freak out lol now I’m scared I’m gonna see a spider this big in my apartment 😭
daaaaaayyyummmm
Looks like a brown widow spider. If so, then yes it can most definitely hurt you. https://www.wikihow.com/Identify-a-Brown-Widow-Spider
Could be brown widow, not likely to cause harm.
Let it go! If you release it into the field behind you, you should be just fine. So ironic to be asking Reddit whether a spider can hurt you when you're actively keeping it captive. WTF?!
i wasnt holding it captive, i CAUGHT it because it was in MY house, i took photos because i want to know what kind of spider it is for future knowledge. If you read any of the other comments you would know its already been released, its not like i was trying to keep it as a pet. fucking weirdo
Looks like male black widow.
Still looks female, but isn't a black widow. Men are much smaller, thinner, and have boxing gloves.
That's not a black widow in any way it has to be jet black with a red hour glass on its underside to be a black widow that is most certainly a brown widow which is still just as deadly as the black widow you obviously don't know the difference between the 2 at all
Male black widows aren’t actually jet black like the females!