Any mother of an eight-year-old boy can tell you that whenever he runs into the kitchen with a plastic bucket and shouts, “Hey, Mom! Look what I found!”, you are probably not going to want whatever is in the bucket to get loose in the house.

After shooing him back outside, I took a tentative look into the bucket, prepared for something to jump, crawl or slither out at me. Even expecting the worst, I couldn’t help but shriek and jump back when I saw the spider.

It was huge, with long, black and brown legs –- the kind that would definitely make a snapping noise if stepped on. The body was black with yellow designs on it. And, like I suspect all spiders do, it seemed to stare at me knowing …