September 1, 2006 (Vol. 26, No. 15)
URL:
http://www.washington.edu/burkemuseum/spidermyth
Rating:
Strong Points: Interesting reading
Weak Points: Narrow focus
Summary:
Focused on the insect that people are most commonly afraid of, Spider Myths tackles phobias and other concerns head-on with a collection of informative pages. Put together by Rod Crawford of the Burke Museum (University of Washington), the spider site proclaims that “Everything that ‘everybody knows’ is wrong.” A few misconceptions that surprised me include that spiders are more prevalent in the summer (fall and early winter, actually); daddy longlegs are spiders (some are flies!); and all spiders make webs (not true). As a biologist, I found the information at the site to be quite interesting, and I’m decently impressed at how much Crawford appears to love these little critters.
