Subject: Brown Recluse?
Location: Charleston, SC
July 21, 2017 8:16 pm
Greetings,
I was sitting on my sofa and I saw this spider walk across my living room. It looks to me that it could be a brown recluse. Or maybe a trap door spider?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Signature: -John in Charleston, SC
Dear John,
This does appear to be a Brown Recluse Spider, and the large pedipalps indicate this is a male, similar to the one pictured in this BugGuide posting.
Correction: Male Southern House Spider
Thanks to Catherine Scott and Sean McCann for writing in with comments correcting our identification of this male Southern House Spider.
This is actually a male Kukulcania, likely Kukulcania hibernalis
Thanks for the correction.
Some tips for ID’ing recluse lookalikes here: http://spiderbytes.org/2015/06/08/how-to-tell-if-a-spider-is-not-a-brown-recluse/
Hi there,
this is actually a male Kukulcania (southern house spider). The way the pedipalps stick way out in front of the head of the spider is characteristic of males of this species. The “violin” marking is also much smaller than in an actual brown recluse.
– Catherine Scott
Thanks for the correction.
Hi there,
this is actually a male Kukulcania (southern house spider). The way the pedipalps stick way out in front of the head of the spider is characteristic of males of this species. The “violin” marking is also much smaller than in an actual brown recluse.
– Catherine Scott