That was extremely well written (and absolutely terrifying), Ultrajoe. Thanks for sharing that. You just outlined the evergrowing list of reasons why I will never visit Australia. =)
The Sydney Funnel Web: Unfair
- Thread starter Ultrajoe
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And i suppose anyone looking for a predator should just head there as well, there wil be loads of dead ones killed by that little spiderTherumancer said:You know upon reading this it made me think of Aliens "Nuke 'em from Orbit, it's the only way to be sure!".
Though honestly if we ever do have a problem with those Aliens I suppose we can always deport them to Australia, where they can become lunch for the other wildlife.
I had one in my pool once it was just on the lining in-between the ledge and the water, and the worst part was, that I had to go near it to get out of the pool.
I uh...never looked at Australia as an evil continent....but now....well...I think I will stay away from the former debtors colony country.
Please, are we a little high strung? Dude just recap'd his trip, think of it as a review of his day. I don't see the problem, not like I'm gonna hop a plane from the US to go to this zoo. And, it's a zoo, it's not like he's coming on here selling shamwow. Also, his track record has no previous "advert spamming" that I am aware of. Not spam, dude.hypothetical fact said:
This may be one of the greatest threads I've encountered on my short time here. I'm now shit-scared of Australia and yet also filled with a morbid curiosity to go.
As for deadly stuff, I live in England. Our dedliest animal is the chav, and only when in large groups.
Honestly, I can't think of anything seriously dangerous that lives anywhere near me. I've seen a few foxes, but they always run when they spot me and I wouldn't consider them dangerous. I think my cat is probably the most dangerous animal near me. Or at least she was when she was younger.
As for deadly stuff, I live in England. Our dedliest animal is the chav, and only when in large groups.
Honestly, I can't think of anything seriously dangerous that lives anywhere near me. I've seen a few foxes, but they always run when they spot me and I wouldn't consider them dangerous. I think my cat is probably the most dangerous animal near me. Or at least she was when she was younger.
Probably cause you killed everyone of the animals on that island of yours I bet.Hellion25 said:
huh...i thought we didnt really have too many deadly things in SA...Danzorz said:I hear you.Ultrajoe said:Ever notice how 'Arachnid' sounds a bit like 'Anti-christ'? No? Have you ever noticed that some spiders are scary little suckers that hang in midair supported by silk cables that are stronger then steel and wait for shit to blunder into them? I assume you have, because occasionally people blunder into them and scream like a little girl because their face is all sticky. Well, this spider isn't like that. This spider doesn't hang in midair because Sephiroth already claimed the title 'Most Unholy Evil Prick To Float In The Sky'. The only reason it doesn't swim is because Cthulhu most likely lives off the Australian coast and there would be a turf war. We'll get to him later, there's a point to this story.
This spider is proof of God, proof that he's a malicious ass who feeds on tears and makes anime music videos of rape scenes to 'Yakity Sax'.
Most Australians don't believe our country is as bad as foreigners make out. We laugh as we are told that our wildlife is evil, chuckle and shake our heads as people declare our enviroment 'Hellish' and go back to digging up our martian red soil in the 35 degree heat. Hellish? Mate, this is paradise. Even that little bit of hyperbole was stretching things, we have some fantastic rainforests and utterly adorable swamps and wetlands and things. In short, we don't think our country is as nightmare fuelish as we are told it is... But what if it is!?
Last weekend was my Sisters birthday (The Ultra Joe has Siblings!?, do they get together and crush small nations!? As we live in different states, not so much) and as she is still of the age where she uses a training sword and can barely maul a bull elephant, and because I was in the state and the very earth cowered in fear, we decided to go and visit the Australian Reptile Park, a place now #1 on my list of 'stupid-as-dick places to seek refuge during a zombie apocalypse'. For those of you who don't know, australias reptiles aren't the most acoomodating bunch. We have the largest reptile, in the world, most commonly known as the saltwater crocodile and frequently reffered to as 'Liquid Fear'.
It had more than just reptiles, as it turns out.
We followed this one funny chap around the park as he did talks on all of the Iconic Australian animals and proved that you don't need to be sensible to work with creatures capable of removing your fingers, arms or immolating your living soul. We watched him cheerfully fish around inside a hollow log for a Tasmanian Devil (Devil.) with his bare hand, and drag the screaming (Yes, they scream like a black god) little dervish out of the darkness. This little sucker can flood it's ears with blood to make them glow red, because it feeds on your fear. If there was a superhero named Tazzy Devil, he would eat Wolverine alive, bones and all. We watched this insane zookeeper tease them with a bloody kangaroo leg and then watched these furry chainsaws eat it. All of it.
Then he fed a 3 meter long crocodile named Elvis, I can only assume he was named Elvis because he likes to consume his own weight in hamburgers daily and can never truly die. The rotten chicken (apparently they like eating old corpses, which raises the question of how there got to be new corpses.) was so badly decayed that it fell off the feeding stick and he was forced to prove he has a deathwish and grab it out from near its mouth and toss it at the God-Lizard before he finally munched it down with one bite. For anyone who thinks this isn't that stupid, let me stress that a Salty is not your basic 'Gator. It's a Croc. In a later show he (yes, he survives to give more talks) hands a juvenile 'Gator to some little girl he dragged into the show pit because these things are really just moving logs that snap at passing carrion. An Australian Salty equivalent was brought in, and made every attempt to go beserk and eat the trainer, the little girl, the Gator and the show pit itself. They are not friendly.
He fed some dingo's, letting the things lick all over his face in a display not unlike standing on a shooting range covered in big magnets. Why you would let the asshole of the canine world (think wolf without the class ) taste you!? You can't tame these things, they will maul and defile your corpse in an attempt to become the Alpha male. These things can take down a cow weighing hundreds of kilos trying to kick it's face in, do you think swatting it with a newspaper will stop it feeding you your own asshole?
And the snakes. Oh god, the snakes. There was a show on the snakes (I'm not even going to tell you about the show, this man is the Anti-Murphys-Law), and a large hall or two in the very cool reptile cave-thing. As stated, I have never thought of my country as Evil or that dangerous, but the nameplates alone started to erode my indoctrinated self-assurance. Death Adder. Red Bellied Black Snake (it even looks demonic). Feirce Snake. Taipan. Do you know what Taipan means in Japanese? It means 'Big Boss'. That's right, the son of a ***** Solid Snake was cloned from and who routinely kicked the collective asses of the world probably had to beg and plead to get his name from an Autralian Snake. What the hell, God!? Add in the fact that the most asshole slithery thing in the place is named simply 'Brown Snake' (perhaps the color of your trousers after you find one in your bath. I kid you not) and we get a kind of sick understanding of the creator of this continent. It was dawning on me that perhaps I was the one ignorant of the true nature of my beloved land down under.
The turning point was the Spiders.
I can live with the trees with the poison hair (every other tree forms a symbiotic relationship with animals, using them to spread seeds. There is no excuse for this tree, it is simply a jerk). I can live with the poison-torpedo shooting seashells. I forgave the jellyfish. I can look past the snakes. I can forgive the fact that both of our national animals routinely maul tourists who think they're cute, rather than malevolent and twitchy sacks of hate equipped with sonic-ram-legs. I can forgive the Blue Ringed Octopus. I can forgive the fact that Spore: Australia Edition would be MA 15+. But I cannot forgive the Sydney Funnel Web. Not in a million years will there ever be an excuse for the Sydney Funnel Web.
This is #1 on 'shit you don't want to bite you'. Period. If you get bitten by a snake, you have over 4 hours until the damage becomes chronic and sometimes up to 12 before you keel over dead (it's the heat and long distances to hospitals that make australia so nasty with snakes, that and the fact that our snakes have venom you could clean grease stains with). Not so with the SFW, the record for surviving this Eight-Legged-Armaggedon is an Hour and sixteen minutes. The record. That was a healthy, very healthy man, fully hydrated and who knew how to treat the wound and stem the flow of poison and had god on his side (fickle ass). You, unprepared and unaware, will last 40 minutes, maximum. Think about how long that is, that's not a long time. That's not counting the fact that your fate is sealed after about 25 minutes, mind you, and you'd better hope the ambulance reaches you in time.
Let me give you a rundown of what a whack from this thing will do to you:
1) Agonising Pain. Not 'ow, put an ice-block on that' agony, but roll on the floor and beg for death agony. Neurotoxin is an utter ***** and will rape your nerve endings and make you see Satan.
2) Drooling. Not spit, not the pre-vomit wet-mouthness. After only 5 minutes you will drool so much and so uncontrollably you can barely breath or speak, making calling for help really hard. Did we mention agony more extreme than anything you have ever felt?
3) After this point, the fun stuff starts. You will cry, pee and crap blood, you will drool and vomit blood and the agony that once made you want to cut off your bitten limb has now spread to your entire body and is making every nerve scream for death.
And this little prick of an animal will bite you multiple times, if he can get you, because he feeds on your tears.
You die at this point. Ambulance drivers don't rush for snake bites, save to spare you prolonged pain before you get the cure. They will run red lights, scrape up against other cars and mount the sidewalk to get a funnelweb victim to the hospital, because after they've got there the guy is usually crying blood already.
If it bites your hand and you survive (making you honorarily Ultra), you will lose fingers, if it bites your foot be prepared to lose it, if it bites your face you're about to become one ugly fucker. Most of Australia's wildlife gets exaggerated in its lethality (at least I thought it did), even though everything here bar the sheep spit poison (the trees, damnit! Poison Trees!), but not the funnelweb.
I'm Not Trying To Look Bigger. I'm Preventing Your Escape.
look at those god damn fangs, they can drive those suckers through your toenails. I wouldn't mind the evil bastards if they lived out in the western wastes like all the rest of our anti-christ animals, but this is the, by name: Sydney Funnel Web. How is this fair? It's like having the 'Suburban Sewer Grizzly', and it weilds a chainsaw. For god's sake, it's not even a restrained arachnid bastard, it's known for being an agressive little fuck. The males, the ones with venom 10 times more potent than the females (that's right, 10 times) are designed to wander looking for females, who hide in (duh) funnel webs. Let me spell that out: It's an agressive, sadistic, overly toxic hairy asshole and it's made to wander all over sydney crawling into warm and enclosed spaces like your shoes and gloves and houses, and it can bite through your toenail when you have the audacity to wake it up in the morning. It's vexom has Hemotoxic, Neurotoxic and Necrotic effects. I don't know what that last part means exactly but Necrotic is never good and it may raise you as a zombie. Not fair.
This is what gets me. Not that it's evil, not that it's deadly, not that i'd rather burn to death while drowning rather than die of this thing, but that it has evolved and adapted in a short period of time to make Sydney (and you thought the cities were safe...) it's stomping ground. It's not natural, it's vindictive. It's proof of a malevolent God and i'll dare any person to be bitten by this sucker and not beg for divine intervention.
-----
The Point Of This Thread: The Aussie reptile park is a private venture, it gets no funding for the amazing conservation work it does for Tazzy Devils and several other endangered species. The only thing seperating these adorable and deadly critters from leaving us forever is the entry fees of those who visit the good people there.
If you wanted to see all these deadly creatures (and a whole bunch of non-lethal and cute/awesome ones as well) in a safe place, the Reptile Park is the place to go. The crazy guys there are friendly, warm and often hilarious. They love their jobs. If you're a local, a tourist, or want to see a grown man piss of an Eight-legged Satan for your amusement (and then learn to survive it), then drop by. Nature will spare you one horrible death.
The SFW has a strike range of literally 0. It's fangs are so large it can only kill things directly below its mouth, and can't move when in a striking position (see above). It can't run fast or leap at you, and if you check your shoes and don't be a dick you can survive an encounter with the little sucker (hand him into authorities to make anti-venom! Take that, SFW!)
Snakes are lazy bastards, and will not chase you. Except perhaps the Brown Snake, because it's a jerk.
Yeah, I just advertised for something. But it's based on an anecdotal good time and a genuine desire to help out the good folks at the ARP, so if you have a complaint i'm teachng Funnelwebs to jump and introducing them to your ecosystem. Whahahaha.
PS: I know exactly what Necrotic means. The bite from the SFW will bleed for so long even after it stops hurting that you may just wish it had killed you.
In Adelaide we have one of the highest concentrations of deadly creatures in Australia. We have brown snakes everywhere, scorpions, SCORPIONS, SCORPIONS. Scorpions that do worse, we have the most of them, not to mention the brown snake, that thing has been known to use it's venom to paralyzes it's pray...okay it's venom will do that.., it's been known to eat humans, not all of us, just the arms as the legs, you lie there, as it slowly eats you.
[HEADING=1]IT EATS YOU AS YOU WRITHE IN PAIN FROM IT'S NEUROTOXIN![/HEADING]
Here is a food chain diagram.
Humans
^
|
|
Everything else.
Here is mine.
Brown Snake and Sydney Funnel Web.
^
|
|
GOD (The fact that the SFW already exists challenges his existence)
^
|
|
Satan
^
|
|
Humans
^
|
|
Everything else.
Joe, be glad most of the aussie wildlife uses neurotoxins and not necrotoxins.
IF you had to choose between dying from either, neurotoxins are infinitely preferable, even if the pain is rather insane. Death usually comes a lot faster with neurotoxins.
A necrotoxin causes whatever it poisons to go necrotic, i.e. it slowly dies and starts to rot, while it's still attached to you and the effect generally spreads pretty fast. The spreading isn't even part of the toxin as such, dying cells cause healthy cells around them to self-destruct due to the chemicals they release. You can treat the poison (if they get to you fast enough), but the necrotic effect won't stop on its own, they need to amputate a bit that's still healthy to make sure it doesn't just keep going.
Having the flesh literally rot off your bones while you get to watch isn't an experience you'd wish on anyone.
IF you had to choose between dying from either, neurotoxins are infinitely preferable, even if the pain is rather insane. Death usually comes a lot faster with neurotoxins.
A necrotoxin causes whatever it poisons to go necrotic, i.e. it slowly dies and starts to rot, while it's still attached to you and the effect generally spreads pretty fast. The spreading isn't even part of the toxin as such, dying cells cause healthy cells around them to self-destruct due to the chemicals they release. You can treat the poison (if they get to you fast enough), but the necrotic effect won't stop on its own, they need to amputate a bit that's still healthy to make sure it doesn't just keep going.
Having the flesh literally rot off your bones while you get to watch isn't an experience you'd wish on anyone.
Well not me personally but maybe...Bulletinmybrain said:
We do get some pretty nasty Jellyfish, though nothing in comparison to say the Box Jellyfish or anything. Thinking about it, isn't the Box another Aussie animal? Or am I mixing up my animal geography?
You're right, this has no place in the off-topic forum. What the hell was I thinking? I'm flooded with remorse at the thought of all the quality threads I pushed off the front page in favor of this pointless rant! Imagine what the world could be if that cloned religion thread had stuck around for a few more hours, the original and relevant content it would have given us. Think of the unsaid logical fallacies. I'm such a bastard, look at me, wasting your time with this essay-length joke. I should be held down and forced to be bitten by a Fierce Snake.hypothetical fact said:
I mean, what was I thinking!? There's no point to this thing! My hands just kind of spasmed across the keyboard and left a trail of pointless words which have no purpose. And worst of all, I cap all of this off with an advert, how did I ever think I could get away with that after writing all of that story for you!? And the reiterate, how did I think this deserved to displace so many proper posts!? Why, this post will make this thread displace such gems as 'Reasons you should not have kids' and a poll on Ninja warriors! Think of the children we might have!
I can't believe I wasted so much utterly pointless text before that advert. Really, a simple 'Visit the reptile park kthxbai' would have done everything this thread accomplishes. It would have entertained, informed and promted as much discussion and enjoyment from people as any amount of anecdote.
Forgive me, please.
I am never-ever-ever-ever-ever-ever-eeeeevvvvvveeeerrrrr.
Going to australia >_< fuck risking running into that!
Going to australia >_< fuck risking running into that!
I'm just rather amused he's acting like the voice of a disinterested community, given which community this is and what usually graces the Off-Topic. I must admit I became a bit Sardonic, perhaps vindictively sarcastic, at the suggestion that this post was entirely pointless and not welcome, but lets be thankful I managed even that level of subtlety. But seriously, come on, he has a problem with the relevance of this post and all of a sudden his opinion is the swinging censor of good citizenship?Labyrinth said:
At least when I post my irrelevant personal notions, I have the decency to make them worth reading.
In other news, I looked up the effects of a bite from a Blue-Ring octupus. They do not need repeating. Things with 8 legs suck.
