From an early age, we’re exposed to many myths and hard-to-believe truths about insects. How spider savvy are you? Read below and find out!
We swallow eight spiders in our sleep each year. True or False?
False. This long-standing myth has been around for years. However, no need to sleep in fear. While not impossible, several factors make the likeliness of this happening slim. First, your mouth would need to be open very wide for a spider to enter, and luckily, few of us sleep as if we’re at the dentist! Most people are likely to wake up if they feel something crawling across their face, and particularly, their lips. Lastly, if a spider were to get this far and land at the back of your throat, the act of swallowing is still required to make this myth true. And those odds are pretty low. This being said, we all can rest easy.
Most spider species live at most for two years though there are some species (tarantulas for instance) that can live more than 20 years. True or False?
True. Are you wishing you were a tarantula if you had to be a spider? Us too! That’s right though, the average spider is lucky to live to their second birthday. Tarantulas are a different story. These hairy creatures are among the largest spiders — they are able to kill lizards, mice and even birds. It usually takes a tarantula anywhere from two to 10 years (longer than the average spiders’ lifetime) to reach adulthood. In addition, females are known to live longer, usually 30 to 40 years. The oldest tarantula on record lived 49 years!
