Irish Examiner view: Mammals beware

Carnivorous spiders

Scientists in Galway have published the first record of a noble false widow spider feeding on a protected species of bat in the UK. Picture:  Ben Waddams/PA

Just when you thought that there’s enough depressing news in the world, research emerges from Galway which shows a noble false widow spider feeding on a bat in the UK, the first such example of them preying on mammals. That’s us.

While this is, no doubt, hugely exciting for arachnologists, and a feather in the caps of John Dunbar and Michel Dugon of the venom systems lab in the Ryan Institute at NUI Galway, for the section of the population who are arachnophobic (that can be up to 15%) perhaps the thrills and sense of joy are less intense.