Giant spider feast for morepork?
A large Australian spider that built itself a golden new home in Mapua, near Nelson, has disappeared.
The Bibby family were gutted to discover a large hole in the web under their pergola where the golden orb web spider had resided, feasting on bees and wasps.
‘‘We assume something got it,’’ Helen Bibby said on Friday. ‘‘Whether it’s a morepork or what, I don’t know but it must have been something brave.’’
The family had hunted around the garden but there was no sign of the spider, which had been described as bigger than the span of a man’s hand.
News of the arachnid’s disappearance comes just a day after a story about her arrival caused a flurry of comment online, from calls for her to be destroyed to admiration for her beauty.
The family first noticed the spider last week and had watched her consume a bumble bee, a honey bee and a paper wasp.
She had also built a large food cache above the hub of her ‘‘amazingly strong’’ web that had a distinctive golden colour.
Landcare Research technician Grace Hall, who works in the national insect collection at Auckland, said golden orb web spiders tended to be brought across by wind currents from Australia as spiderlings.
‘‘They probably came around December but people don’t notice them until they get to this size.’’
There had been six reported so far this year, mostly in Waikato and Auckland. The spider at the Bibbys’ house was the first reported in the South Island since 2005, she said.
All the golden orb web spiders reported were females. None of the much-smaller males had ever been found in New Zealand, Hall said.
While the golden orb web spider could deliver a bite, ‘‘they’re not considered venomous to us’’.
None of these delicate Australian imports were expected to survive the New Zealand winter.
Helen Bibby said it might have been better if the spider was taken, rather than be left to die slowly with the oncoming cold.
She said she wouldn’t be against having a golden orb web spider again.
‘‘I wouldn’t have wanted to touch it but it was beautiful.’’