O.K heres the thing - I went out for a goodbye dinner last night (5 weeks until we go to Melbourne) and as i left my friend 'mentioned' the spiders saying don't worry too much about the redback, but the funnel web is lethal, aggressive, massive, everywhere etc etc.
as the move to Australia is supposed to give my 2 boys a great back garden for them to play in I am now PANICKING about spiders inside the house and outside.
And I hate spiders!!1
any info?? please tell me something to reassure me??!!

No funnel webs in Melbourne

I see a quite a few wolf spiders, but have only seen one redback, one huntsman and no funnel webs (called the sydney funnel web for a reason ).

I think your friend has watched too many wildlife programmes

sorry to change subject what about Snakes because on a trip 2 years ago stayed in Melbourne and the person we stayed with had come across one in they garden this was in a place called Melton, are they poisonous in the melbourne area,not sure what snake it was

Yes they're all poisonous, but you rarely see them, just don't walk through long grass and you should be fine.

Or live near a marsh like me :scared:

We do, we live opposite wetlands and they're loasds of them round here , mainly cats and dogs getting bit.

We did find a baby one in our garage and the snake catcher is always at Henrys kindy :scared:

Yes, there is a resident snake catcher at my daughters school as well.

sorry but why live by a marsh surely other nastys live in Marsh's :scared:

Well we wanted to rent near my Aunt and only had 14 days to find something. So we took the first rental we could get.

There are lots of Mosquito's and the odd snake but nothing else

My son saw a redback down at Aldinga in the shopping plaza the first week we were here. I also had one in my office a couple of weeks ago and then last weekend we were at Seaford and saw a whitetail. When Ron was putting some stuff away in the garage he came across a nest of huntschildren (baby huntsmans) and their momma; a huntswoman. At least he assumes it was the momma spider as it was not as big as a male. Either way it was pretty gross.

Funnel webs and the larger spiders either hide in holes or have huge webs, as in the Golden orb spider.
They don't usually come out during the day and when they do, it's so they can go hunting, so usually 6pm or thereabouts. If by some extreme stroke of misfortune one found its way into your house, I would say you'd notice it extremely quickly.
Ways to avoid getting bitten by big spiders is

a) Don't poke them
b) Don't stick your fingers down holes
c) Don't harrass them
d) Don't garden without gloves (as this is where the most bites occur)
e) If it's black and ugly, it's like that for a reason, so don't touch it.
f) If you see a spider in a web, leave it alone.
g) Teach your children all of the above...

In the unlikely event you come across one, it can be deterred quite reasonably by the wearing of a large gumboot and a bit of vertical pressure. Either that or you can kick it to the door and out. Or use a long brush.

As for the smaller ones, once again:

a) Don't poke them
b) Don't put your fingers in places you can't see
c) Inspect your outdoor furniture regularly, esp underneath, and also children's outdoor toys.
d) If you have several, use a can of Mortein on them
e) Use an outside spray, where they have appeared.

Spiders don't wander around all day every day and you're not sweeping them into piles before you brush them outside. I live in a very high bush area and we have only seen a few large spiders in the months we've been here. We have Huntsman spiders in the house but we leave those alone as they eat the nasties, such as mozzies and roaches.

If you're moving to Aus, there are some things you're just going to come to terms with... they're here and so are you. Leave them alone and they usually leave you alone. Usually.

If you're really worried, get your house sprayed. This one isn't sprayed and we've never had a poisonous spider in the house... they're all outside, AFAIK!

Hi,

What we found was to get acquainted with Morteins products and prepare to become a mass murderer!!

Job done

Leo :scared:

Relax, don't do it. No, hang on, that's a song. I don't recall ever seeing a newspaper article or TV news item about "thousand of Aussies dying in poisonous spider rampage."
Now the sharks, that's a different matter.............

Oh my god don't say that, I HATE DETEST LOATH spiders bloody things, but am coming to terms with the fact we WILL See them or maybe at worst have to go to hospital for a bite after I thank it by squishing it into a pattern on the floor and thanks to dad buying me 5 spider catchers I think i'll be fine, snakes i'm not overly concerned about (yet), but i've seen Jaws :scared: and the kids and hubby have been talking about surfing OMG.
There have to be sharks around Melbourne cause of Phillip Island, theres a bloody picture of great white in the Melways for crying out loud so I know they must be there?
IS it unreasonable to want the nasty big man eatign sharks extinct? sorry but I had nightmares for years thinking what a horrible way to go being eaten by one of those things. I don't even swim in the sea here for crying out loud, one cause it's too flippig cold and 2 just incase a great white migrates over here.

Jen