Talk:Pholcus phalangioides

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 15 September 2020 and 17 December 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Kekaze (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Cjing99, Ahamed01, Stomatz.

Merge required?

This article probably needs to be merged with Daddy long-legs spider (or vice versa, i.e. I prefer the scientific name because the common name is so confusing). Anbd it needs an entry in the disambiuguation page Daddy longlegs. Rocksong 05:32, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Whoever merged the two articles deleted a lot of information found in the entry for Daddy long-legs spider. For instance, I think it's already been well established that Pholcids can penetrate human skin, in fact almost every spider can, although the venom has no effect. This very information is confirmed almost word for word in the very link you provide to verify that P. phalangioides are harmless. And yet this article again erroneously "informs" the reader that pholcids cannot penetrate human skin. Secondly, the wording is extremely poor, for example; "This is probably to blur the vision of a predator" To blur the predator's vision? Or to make themselves harder to see? There's a huge difference. Thirdly, "daddly long-legs" is a blanket term applying to many pholcid spiders, since a few them look almost indentical except for the general shape of the abdomen. The article should begin by informing the reader that "Daddy long-legs spider" is a nickname usually refering to P. phalangioides. --Mad Max 03:12, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

No merging has been done yet. The old Daddy long-legs spider article has been renamed to Pholcidae. (Which is kind of confusing because Daddy long-legs spider is now a redirect to Pholcus phalangioides). If those two articles remain unmerged, some editing is required, so that the family-specific stuff is in Pholcidae and the species-specific stuff is here in Pholcus phalangioides. Rocksong 09:40, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Still confusing because "Cellar spider" redirects to this article ('Pholcus phalangioides'), but http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pholcidae would seem the more general/more useful article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wizofaus (talk • contribs) 22:33, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

Contradictory Sources

The "long description" link at http://www.xs4all.nl/~ednieuw/Spiders/Pholcidae/Pholcidae.htm states that: "Since the fangs of these spiders are too small to penetrate the skin, it is not considered a dangerous spider." This directly contradicts the article. Should the resource be removed? Stinkman 06:15, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Problem with the map of distribution

I live in Perth in Western Australia, and we certainly get these spiders. But the map included would indicate that they only exist in the eastern states. Shouldn't this be fixed? Black-Velvet 12:02, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

I'm surprised this query has been hanging for three years. I was just researching this spider and came here to make alert of the exact same thing. These spiders are highly commonplace in Western Australia, and probably a lot of other greyed areas of the country. Revendetta (talk) 10:00, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

These spiders are also quite abundant in Mexico, where they go by the name "araña patona" ("long-legged spider"). However, the map doesn't include this region. I also hope this can be fixed soon. Theodopulus (talk) 02:35, 25 October 2015 (UTC)

@Black-Velvet: @Theodopulus: Firstly, I'm not sure that User:Sarefo, who drew the map, is around much these days – his record shows 14 edits this year to date. You could ask at User talk:Sarefo.

Secondly, the map must be based on a reliable source, not just personal observations by editors. Are there sources for the wider distribution? Peter coxhead (talk) 10:42, 25 October 2015 (UTC)

Picture

The picture does a poor job representing what a phalangioides really looks like; it seems to provide better for shock value than for any educational purpose. Does anyone have a better one?72.81.38.64 (talk) 01:27, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree. I found another one and used that. Peter Ballard (talk) 10:28, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

my run in with the daddy long legs or cellar spider.

recently my spouse and i moved into a new residence. after a few hours we noticed that it had a spider infestation. after killing numerous amounts of this one type of spiders and spraying poisin throughout the house we decided to do some research on this spider to see if it was detrimental to our childrens health. we came across this page and immediately indentified our spider as the cellar spider or daddy long legs i would like to know if we have to be caustious and worry about our children dying from a bite by one of these spiders? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.56.239.238 (talk) 20:27, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

There is already some general guidance in the article, but please be aware that Wikipedia has a specific policy that it does not give out medical advice - see Wikipedia:Medical disclaimer. If want to know my personal opinion, ask me at User talk:Peter Ballard. Peter Ballard (talk) 05:55, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Reply: The Daddy Longlegs Spider is not deadly. It is harmless to humans. It's venom is weak.Please Reply if i am wrong --58.170.1.130 (talk) 04:20, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

I'd be more worried about the poisons you sprayed everywhere. Hesperian 04:23, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

reliable sorces of information

Umm, who figures "MythBusters" is a scientificly established source of information? Its a great show, but its no source of reliable information. Any references to the show are completely irrelevant here. 173.183.146.29 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 17:34, 29 July 2010 (UTC).

Yeah, and I thought the myth about Daddy Longlegs usually referred to Opiliones in that case, not Pholcus Phalangioides. Heck, until the year I looked up "Daddy Longlegs" on Wikipedia, I didn't know these existed, even though they probably live in my basement and that I've probably seen the webs before. 96.245.50.130 (talk) 17:52, 5 June 2016 (UTC)

Primary Photo

The primary photo of the animal in the top right corner shows it consuming a fly or other insect of some sort. At first glance, this can give one an incorrect impression of what the animal looks like. In the gallery of images that this image is from, there are several where it is not consuming another insect or carrying eggs or whatever that I feel would serve as a better representation of the animal. 184.88.235.102 (talk) 19:31, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

"daddy longlegs" as a common name

Why was the common name "daddy long-legs" removed? Confusingly the article has a section with these words:

"Confusion often arises over its common name, because "daddy long-legs" is also applied to two other distantly related arthropods: one being Opiliones, another order of arachnid known ::also as a "harvestman", the other an insect less ambiguously called the crane fly."

Despite the article does not mention anywhere else that it has the common name "daddy long-legs spider". Come on, this article has become much worse than it was previously.109.57.247.56 (talk) 20:35, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for catching that. I have tentatively removed that statement pending discussion on whether "daddy longlegs" should be included as a common name, as some sources used in this article would indicate. In my experience, the term "daddy longlegs" is incorrect when used for this species. I grew up using the term only for Opiliones. But it seems the usage varies by region.

See the first section above, "Merge required?", which appears never to have been resolved. Eric ^talk 21:21, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

Hesperian, do you have a source to support placing "daddy long-legs" ahead of "cellar spider" as a common name? Eric ^talk 01:50, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

Ordering is style not content. You want a source for what exactly? -- a source that says that "daddy long-legs" has sentence order primacy over "cellar spider"? Hesperian 02:14, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

Um, no, not that exactly. Sorry if my question was not clear. A source that demonstrates that "daddy long-legs" is in widespread use, correctly, as a common name for P. phalangioides. One that might explain why it's not included as a common name in the ITIS report for the species, while it is in the species description by the Australian Museum. A look through the history of this article will show that this name has been at issue here over the years. Eric ^talk 12:54, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

@Eric: how about this source? Of course, it could be argued that sources only spend so much time explaining why "daddy long-legs" is the 'wrong' name because it's widely used. Peter coxhead (talk) 15:28, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

Hi @Peter- Thanks, that's a good 'un! Well, it seems we should work this name into the intro somehow. It just occurred to me to check my favorite insect id site, and there I discover some interesting info regarding the etymology of phalangioides. Eric ^talk 16:09, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

It should at least be mentioned that it is also called the "daddy long legs" spider, as well as "cellar spider". It is only the "long bodied cellar spider" because in America there's a "short bodied cellar spider". This distinction is not needed in Britain, where it may just be the cellar spider. 109.57.247.56 (talk) 19:29, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

mating behavior

This article has been expanded well. This is a very well-known spider - I would like to see information added about its mating behavior. What is the maternal and paternal care like in this species? Also, it may be useful to add information about the genitalia and reproductive systems and cycles of this species. Cjing99 (talk) 02:54, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

peer review summary

For this article, I consolidated the lead section into one paragraph. I also made several minor grammatical changes to add in commas, correct spellings, and improve sentence flow. I added links for a few terms, corrected issues with italicization (some species names not italicized, other names, such as salticid, did not need to be italicized), and removed phrases like “in studies” to make sentences more concise and in-line with Wikipedia guidelines. I found the switching between names (daddy long legs, skull spider, and P. phalangioides) confusing at times, so I changed some of the uses of the common names to the latin name. Since daddy long legs is a common name attributed to other species, suggest avoiding using this name after the lead section, and changed it in a few particularly confusing areas. The last few sections switch almost exclusively to the use of the name skull spider, which is not used in the first half of the article, so I changed most of these to the scientific name as well. I made some more significant edits to the predator section as the wording made the distinction between predator (jumping spider) and prey (P. phalangioides) ambiguous. I would just make sure the naming is consistent across the article, but everything else looked great! Stomatz (talk) 03:00, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

ahamed01 (talk)I really liked the information on the medicinal use of their webs. This was an intriguing and such a unique fact mentioned about this spider. I also appreciated how the headers were very indicative of what the topic about the spider would be about. The Wikipedia article had information on a variety of topics and there was relevant information on the background of the spider. The references were organized in a well manner. In terms of editing, I made some small suggestions and fixed grammatical errors. I noticed that some species were italicized while others were not, so I made it all consistent. I also hyperlinked some common information. —Preceding undated comment added 03:56, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi! I thought this was a very well-thought out and extensive article. I especially enjoyed learning about the medicinal and antibacterial properties of the spider silk. I removed a few words that I found to be inconsistent with the flow of the article such as simplifying "they themselves" to "they" and phrases like "in fact." I also changed Venom as a sub-heading for the more general heading of Bite. I would suggest adding a section on the egg sacs as it seems that there are a few images in the gallery regarding that topic. In general, this was a nicely organized article with interesting topics — Preceding unsigned comment added by Davidcho122 (talk • contribs) 04:34, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

ahamed (talk This was definitely a very interesting article. I appreciate all the suggestions you implemented. I added a few more hyperlinks but overall I think this is a great article and a potential example of a good source article. I did remove a few words that seemed to be repetitive, but nothing major at all. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ahamed01 (talk • contribs) 23:42, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

Fellow student article feedback

Hi Keyon! I really like the Wiki page, I think it contains a great variety of information about P. phalangioides. I also think the style in which it's written is good for Wikipedia and doesn't come across as journal article-like. I made a few small spelling and grammar edits, or changed the way certain sentences were phrased. Content-wise, I first added a sentence about how several other species go by the name "daddy long legs," and that as a result the term can be misleading. I then also noticed that common names were used to reference the species in several places in the article and changed these all to the scientific name. Lastly, I removed the picture of a harvestman because I felt like it wasn't relevant to the article and could confuse readers who are trying to understand what P. phalangioides looks like. Otherwise, the article could be worth of Good Article status! Shay bala (talk) 21:55, 15 December 2020 (UTC)

Kekaze (talk) 07:42, 22 December 2020 (UTC)