Nederlandse versie This site contains more than 700 pictures of over 220 spiders commonly found in NW-Europe, especially the area between the Netherlands and the south of France. There is a thumbnail page and a Spider location chart for a quick overview of all the spiders posted on these pages. Of all photographed spiders, there is a short description about their habitat, size and other interesting facts. Apart from the European spiders I have also posted more than 200 pictures of Australian spiders. Most people think that spiders are dangerous creatures that should be wiped away with a cloth, sucked up in the vacuum cleaner or smashed with a newspaper. That is not wise because spiders play a very important role in our Eco-system. They catch many annoying and harmful insects and are therefore very useful creatures. As you will see on these pages, many of the spiders are beautifully colored, and therefore very pleasant and wonderful to look at. Since most spiders are very small, you need a magnifying glass or a camera to study them or to reveal their beauty. I receive many questions about poisonous/venomous spiders. Most spiders use venom to kill their prey. This venom is almost always harmless to humans. However, there are a few exceptions. In Europe there is one known spider, called the black widow, whose bite can be lethal to young children and elderly people. she lives in the southern parts of Europe.

Argiope bruennichi or wasp spider is moving up north and is spotted in The Netherlands.

Also the bite of a water spider can be harmful and should be avoided. There are some spiders dangerous in other continents, like the brown recluse. If there are venomous spiders in your neighborhood, you will probably know by word of mouth. If you have never heard of dangerous spiders from the people in your neighborhood it is not very likely the spiders around your house are venomous to you or your pets. Information about dangerous spiders can be found on several Internet sites. (See the links below).

Which spiders can we find inside the house?

Daddy longleg. House spider with daddy-longleg	House spider	Glue spitter	Garden spider

The house spider (Agelenidae) is a famous "scary" spider. In autumn the males are often spotted searching for a female. He runs on his long legs through our house, especially if we are watching television. Leave him alone and after a few minutes he is gone or eaten by the cat.
The garden spider (Araneidae) is also often seen in her wheel web. To see the glue spitter (Scytodidae) you have to look better.
The daddy longleg (Pholcidae) is the greatest killer inside your house. In winter she almost kills all surviving insects and they even kill their own kin.

The spider often seen in the US is the Argiope aurantia (Family Araneidae). Pictures of Argiopes from different continents can be seen on the following pages: Europe, USA and Australia.

In a study, the Panamese wheel spider was observed for a year. It consumed an average of 1.63 insects (= 0.089 g) a day. A study in Great Britain estimated an average of 130.8 spiders living in a meadow per square meter. If we extrapolate this to Holland with 15 million habitants on 36150 square kilometers (4.4 human beings per hectare), we can make the next calculation: spiders living on one hectare consume 116.4 kg of animal material every day. In other words, spiders eat the weight of all humans living in Holland in three days!

Many people confuse spiders with insects. Both belong to the phylum Arthropoda in the animal kingdom, which consists of animals with segmented bodies and jointed appendages. The phylum Arthropoda is divided into 5 classes. Animals with 4 pairs of legs such as spiders belong to the class called Arachnida and animals with 3 pairs of legs such as insects belong to the class called Insecta. Scorpions, pseudoscorpions, mites, harvestmen and ticks (which can cause Lyme disease), also have 4 pairs of legs, and therefore also belong to the Arachnida. Within the class Arachnida the spiders belong to the order called Araneae.

Arthropoda

Class Arachnida Part of the tree of life site

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Literature

1. W. van Katwijk, Spinnen van Nederland,1976, Balkema - Rotterdam - The Netherlands, ISBN 90 6191 1028
2. D. Jones, Spinnen, 1983, Thieme - Baarn - The Netherlands, ISBN 90 5210 121 3
3. H. Pfletsinger, Spinnen, Thieme - Zutphen - The Netherlands, ISBN 9009 95020 2
4. F. Sauer, J. Wunderlich, Die schönsten Spinnen Europas, 1991, Eichenweg 8, 8047 Karlsfeld, Germany, ISBN 3 923010 03 6
5. B. & M. Baehr, Welche Spinne ist das?, 1987, Kosmos naturführer, Stuttgart, Germany, ISBN 3 440 05798 4
6. H. Bellman, Spinnen beobachten, bestimmen, 1992, Naturbuch verlag, Augsburg, Germany, ISBN 3 89440 064 1
7. E. Kullmann, H. Stern, Leben am seidenen Faden, Die rätselvolle welt der spinnen, 1975, Verlagsgruppe Bertelsmann Verlag, Munchen, Germany, ISBN 90 222 0239 9
8. M.J. Roberts, Spiders of Britain & northern Europe, 1995, Harper Collins Publishers, ISBN 000 219981 5
9. R & K Preston-Mafham, Spiders of the world, 1984, Blandford, ISBN0 7137 2392 0
10. Journals published by the Werkgroep Inheemse Spinnen (WIS), Bollenbergen 45, 9052 Zwijnaarde, Belgium
11. H. Bellmann, Spinnentiere Europas, 1997, Kosmos, Stuttgart, Germany, ISBN 3-440-07025-5
12. B. Simon - Brunett, The silken web, 1994, Reed books, Chatswood NSW, Australia, ISBN 0 7301 0401 X
13. S. Heimer, Spinnen, 1997, Landbuch verlag, Hannover, Germany, ISBN 3 7842 0543 7
14. W.J. Gertsch, American spiders, 1949, D. van Nostrand company, USA
15. R. Mascord, Australian spiders, 1970, Reed, Artarmon, Australia, SBN 589 07065 7
16. K.C. McKeown, Australian spiders, 1962, Sirius books, Australia
17. R.F. Foelix, Biology of spiders, 1996, Oxford university press, ISBN 0-19-509594-4
18. P. Hillyard, The book of the spider, 1994,Avon books,ISBN 9 780380 730759
19. J.H. Emerton, The common spiders of the United States, 1961, Dover publications, New York, ISBN 9 780486 202235
20. T.H. Savory, The spiders & allied orders of the British isles, 1935, Frederick Wayne & Co, London
21. E. Simon, Les arachnides de France Tome 6 , 1914 - 1937, Paris.
22. E. Simon, Histoire naturelle de araignees, 1864, Paris

Ed Nieuwenhuys, september 11, 2004

For non-European readers: I am not very familiar with the spiders living outside Europe. Therefore I may not be a lot of help in identifying the spider you come across. Anyway, have a look at the pictures of the crab spiders and the orb web spiders. There is a 90% chance that the spider you found resembles either of these two.

E-mail: Click

My sincere thanks to Craig Slawson (Council member of the British Arachnological Society) who carefully read these Webpages in February 1997 and gave me some valuable suggestions.
I also would like to acknowledge Bryan Goethals for providing me with some translated excerpts from his publications in the journals of WIS (Werkgroep Inheemse Spinnen) as well as for several corrections suggested by him.
Also thanks to Annemarie van Nieuwenhuijze, Ronald Loggen, Vinay Koshte, Gie Wyckmans and Luc Vanhercke for all the other support to make these pages worthwhile.