Talk:Giant huntsman spider

A fact from Giant huntsman spider appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 19 December 2008, and was viewed approximately 29,478 times (disclaimer) (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that with a leg-span of 30 centimetres (12 inches), the giant huntsman (pictured) is one of the world's largest spiders?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2008/December.

Wikipedia

Largest Spider?

At the top of the article, it describes the Giant huntsman spider as "probably the world's largest spider". There is a link in the See Also section to the Goliath birdeater, Theraphosa blondi which, and I quote, "is considered to be the largest spider in the world.". So, is the Goliath birdeater the largest spider in the world, or is the Giant huntsman spider the largest spider in the world? Bazza1971 (talk) 13:33, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I decided to look at the original publication of the species and, not surprisingly, what is stated there differs from what is suggested by the secondary sources (the National Geographic article that may or may not have been quoting WWF). The author of the species description says "While investigating these colossal spiders, the question appeared, whether they could be the largest representatives of the family Sparassidae in the world." In other words, it is being claimed that it is the largest representative of a particular family of spiders, not all spiders. Also, the claim in the Wikipedia article comes from a National Geograpic story that quotes a WWF report that would have had to have been based on the original publication of the species. At this point I think I may do a little more research, but I am highly tempted to downplay the sensational "world's largest spider" aspect of the article and change it to something a bit more accurate. Mantisia (talk) 14:00, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I looked into this a little more and the WWF statement only claims the spider to be the largest Huntsman spider in the world (keeping in line with what the author of the species was saying). As far as I can tell, the claim that this is the world's largest spider was made only by the National Geographic reporter that misunderstood the WWF article. Therefore I have changed the article to reflect this. Mantisia (talk) 14:33, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

endangered?

I can't figure, from the NG article, if this species is considered endangered. Certainly, very little is known about it, and it's rarely seen. Does that equal endangered? --DarkAvenger (talk) 09:44, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I mailed Peter Jaeger who discovered the species back in 2001 and told him about this article. He mentioned that he wasn't too happy about promoting h. maxima because of people wanting to keep it as pets. I don't like the thought of promoting such thoughts in people. I'd like to add a section about such concerns, but I can't find any info on the conservation status or pet trade of this species. --DarkAvenger (talk) 12:20, 21 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Giant Huntsman spider?

I'm not too sure this is an accepted name for the Heteropoda maxima, as I've only seen it as "casual talk". Granted, this is a "giant" "huntsman spider", but as far as I can see, the name applies more directly to the spider described here [1] which is clearly not the same (coloration´, compare to the picture from the National Geographic link). NOTE: I am by no means an expert! --DarkAvenger (talk) 14:24, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Cave dweller

There are two references to the cave-dwelling fact. The first one is simply Jaegers paper, but isn't there something about primary sources? The second link only says that it's a cave dweller, and doesn't go into detail about why, so if the first ref is deleted at some point, some info should go with it --DarkAvenger (talk) 14:01, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There's a reference to Heteropoda maxima and its 30cm size here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildlife/3761269/Spider-as-big-as-a-plate-among-scores-of-new-species-found-in-Greater-Mekong.html

As I'm no expert, is it worth mentioning this article/size either on this page, or the referring huntsman one?

213.120.222.100 (talk) 17:35, 29 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Bite

Is it deadly to humans? That should be included. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.16.27.56 (talk) 01:36, 26 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Discovery

I protest the use of the word "discovery" in relation to this organism. For this would imply that the first time a human observed this spider was in 2001, when there is no way of disproving that it hasn't been observed before by any other human. Thus, I suggest that "discovery" is changed to "classified".

User: Uq 14/05/10 17:47 GMT —Preceding undated comment added 16:49, 14 May 2010 (UTC).[reply]

agreed Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 13:19, 28 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree. It is already implied that the discovery is in relation to modern biologists. More importantly, discovery and classification are not the same processes. An animal isn't classified (described) until it has been formally published. Which is why for a lot of organisms, there is a gap of a few months or even years from the time the animal was discovered and collected, to the time it is classified and named.-- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 23:21, 28 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified

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Photo needs size comparison

Please add a photo with some other object in view, so we can get a visual idea of how big it is. Jidanni (talk) 07:19, 27 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Where they are from

Idk 2604:3D08:607F:FFE0:951E:DDF:3EBD:E038 (talk) 06:27, 11 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]