What's a name?

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Meet Trichonephila fenestrate - aka as Hairy Golden Orb-web Spider – a female specimen in this instance. Beautiful, isn’t she. Unless you suffer from arachnophobia – making you one of 3.5% to 6.1% of the global population, according to Google. I’m assuming that the word ‘population’ refers to the human and not the spider populace which, judging by the little buggers on my front lawn that jump on you and bite, outnumber people. But as suggested below, many male spiders may well be arachnophobic, for good reason.

If you’re a male Trichonephila fenestrate, your relationship with the female species may not be enduring. The objects of your affections have a habit of eating their lovers. Being smaller – as evidenced by the little male, top of picture – doesn’t help and one of the few escapes from its cannibalistic end is autonomisation. (My spell check doesn’t recognise that word either, so let me tell you it means ‘a self-defence mechanism in which an animal or insect or arachnid intentionally sheds or discards one or more of its own body parts—usually an appendage like a leg or tail—to escape a predator's grasp or avoid injury’.) Again I’m indebted to Google.

One needs to get it right when dealing with difficult to pronounce (never mind spell) names. A slip of the tongue, or finger, and you (like me) could end up with Trichophilia. Now this term could possibly, at a stretch, be applied to the male of the species given that it is a Hairy Golden Orb spider. But I don’t think the neologist (you look it up this time) who dreamt up trichophilia had arachnids in mind. Because the word means ‘a hair fetishism or a paraphilia involving intense sexual arousal or obsession with human hair, including touching, smelling, or watching it.’

Despite the dangers the female Golden Orb spiders hold for their suitors, the good news is that they’re not prone to biting humans. And, in rare occurrences where this might happen, their venom is not significantly concerning. Just as well because their silk, used to build webs spanning more than a metre in width, is five time stronger than steel and can even trap small birds.

Now, if anyone has a remedy to stop the jumping spider bites on my leg from itching, please let me know.