Published: June 11, 2009 10:37 pm      

Urban legend gives good spiders bad reputation

Despite the fact that we live in modern times, urban legends still abound. Have you heard this one yet? “Daddy longlegs are one of the most poisonous spiders but their fangs are too short to bite humans.” This tale has been spread around for years, especially among school-aged children. I have heard it time and again.

To make a long explanation short, this just isn’t true. But let me explain why. To start out, there are really two completely different animals that may be referred to as daddy-longlegs or daddy longleg spiders. In the animal class Arachnida, there are several lower divisions called Orders. Scorpions are in the Order Scorpiones and spiders are in the Order Aranae. The creatures most correctly called daddy-longlegs are in their own separate Order called Opiliones. This order is often called daddy longlegs or harvest men, and they have one basic body segment, at most two eyes and all 8 legs attached to their single, pill-like body segment. They’re mostly found under logs or rocks and are never found in webs (unless they’re being eaten by spiders) because they can’t produce silk.

Another group of creatures called daddy longlegs actually are spiders. They have two body basic parts, have eight eyes most often clumped together in front of the body and they are capable of making webs. These animals are plentiful, especially in cellars, and are the type most often seen by the general public.

The Opiliones daddy-longlegs do not have venom glands, fangs or anything else of the sort, so they can’t be poisonous from venom. The Aranae daddy longlegs legend also has no basis in fact. There is simply no record of the spider ever biting a human and causing any negative reaction. These spiders do, however, have fangs (since they are hunters). However, the only way we could know whether the venom is poisonous (since they’ve not been known to bite humans) is to milk the venom and inject it into humans. But this research has never been done (and probably never will be because of humanitarian codes). But the bottom line here is that there is no scientific basis to believe the daddy longlegs spider is poisonous.

To date, there are only two known species of poisonous spider in Oklahoma. Those are the brown recluse spider (also known as the fiddleback) and the black widow. So the next time your grandchild tells you that all of the daddy longlegs running around your cellar are deadly poisonous, show him this article. This is one urban legend that can be put to rest.

SAMANTHA SNYDER is a horticulture educator for the Oklahoma County OSU Cooperative Extension Service.