Here’s the 11th edition of Expiscor! Stories from nature and beyond.

I do apologize as this week’s edition is a little short (and probably contains a few errors)- mainly because I spent the weekend on my bike, doing the Rideau Lakes Cycle Tour. I’m moving a little slow today after that 360 km in a saddle. However, better some Expiscor than none at all, so here goes:

• Poor spiders. Always getting a bad name. even from the weather channel! Unnecessary hysteria, wrong facts, and NO spiders are poisonous (although some are venomous) (thanks to my spider-pal Sam Evans for that link)

• Speaking of venomous spiders, Rick Vetter had another paper out, showing AGAIN that spiders bites are exceedingly rare, and, (I quote): methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus as a ubiquitous cause of skin injury that is often mistaken as attributable to recluse bites.

• And, I suppose if you absolutely HAVE to kill a spider… some advice here.

• Untangling the web - a neat post by Michelle Oyen about spider silk - worth a read (thanks Malcolm Campbell for finding that link)

• Hey look: a blog about Arachnophilia! I like that.

• The Andes are amazing for their diversity of many things, including Arachnids. Here’s a paper that describes a new scorpion species from that region. It has a lovely name: Tityus (Atreus) crassicauda

• INVASION OF THE CATERPILLARS! Wow, British Columbia is experiencing quite the population growth of forest tent caterpillars (thanks Staffan Lindgren for those photos!)

• How about a flood of caterpillars. Look - they can swim! (thanks Dr. Dez)

• in another part of the world… INVASION OF THE RED CRABS.

• So many arthropods. Amazing. Ones that I would like to see again would be Trilobites. Too bad they are extinct. At least we have people like Glendon Mellow drawing stunning pictures of these amazing animals (thanks, Glendon, for permission to repost! - folks - see here for more amazing things from Glendon)

• More beautiful things: a Beetle Sculpture. Stunning. (thanks for that find, Weird Bug Lady)

• Looking North: an important paper that describes shortened flowering seasons in the Arctic, and the related decline of flower visitors. This work was out of the truly amazing Zackenberg monitoring station in Greenland. A+ for long-term monitoring.

• Speaking of the North - a report (PDF) that points to potentially catastrophic changes in the Mackenzie Delta.

• Do you know about poison ivy? Can you identify it? Take this quiz. (it’s worth being educated on this topic!)

• Some good news about managing Emerald Ash Borer: some tiny wasps are doing their ‘biocontrol’ thing….

• The CBC has a sense of humour - can’t have the people seeing Cicadas “doing it”

• Sit down: How interesting can a bench be? Common things are not so common. A lovely and fascinating post. (via SciLogs)

• Discovering Twitter from the Ivory Tower - a skeptic tries it, and likes it.

• Speaking of twitter, it brings me many, many smiles. Here’s the funny tweet of the week, from Jules Bristow (remind you of this?)

• Speaking of funny things… The Onion’s piece on “Man on cusp of having fun suddenly remembers his obligations” made me chuckle.

• This is not so funny. Lego models are getting angrier. I agree - the piles of Lego in my basement confirm that. Too bad. We need happy toys for our kids. (thanks Unpopular Science for the link)

• Canada is a Northern country, but with few people living in the North. For example, our Northernmost community (Grise Fiord) had a graduation ceremony last week. It’s graduation class size was one.

• Driving on the left? Drive on the right? Why the difference? Here’s a video to explain…

• Biking on my mind. Here’s a neat graphic comparing the Tour de France from 1903 with the one from 2013. (thanks Stew for the link!)

• Spider versus Ants. Guess who wins….