Another spider tale

I'm not sure if you've seen this story where you are, but I sat up and listened on Thursday when it was on the radio as I was driving to the pet store to vaccinate puppies. Oooooooooo. This, the largest orb spider in Queensland (maybe the world- let's hope) was photographed in Cairns- which is way north of Brisbane. The arachnologist (I just learned that "spider expert" is an insult! You probably already knew this.) who was interviewed carefully explained that the spider is probably NOT eating the bird. It DID kill it, but now it just wants it out of the web so it can get back to the business of catching insects and Americans.

He also threw in the decidedly unappealing tidbit that these GIANT spiders sometimes can be found in the Northern suburbs of Brisbane! Nooooooooooooooo.

(Obviously, I did not take these photographs. I found these here.)