René Wilder sees a lot of wildlife in the Burnt Mountain area, but some newcomers — Joro spiders — are really putting on a display.
“We’ve never seen this many before up here,” said Wilder, an ad rep for the Times-Courier. “Their webs are pretty amazing. We may not even need to decorate for Halloween!”
Recently, the Georgia News Network reported during a regional radio broadcast that the Joro spider, which first came to the Peach State as an invasive species from Asia in 2014, had been spotted in north Georgia. A headline on their website (georgianewsnetwork.iheart.com) notes there are “Venomous Flying Spiders With 4-Inch Legs Spreading Across the East Coast” (June 4, 2024).
Connie Clark DeVaughn was staying with her son in Kennesaw until her house in Dalton was sold. She began noticing the Joro spiders — an invasive species spreading like gangbusters across Georgia — on his front porch.
“I found one, and then I noticed two more,” she said. “I’m not sure what these spiders are eating because their web shows no insects caught in them. While not noticing one of them, I was bitten on my neck, and it swelled up, but there were no side effects from it. I didn’t want to destroy their webs because the spiders are so beautifully colored.”
However — as DeVaughn attests — the Joro, which is named after a Japanese spider demon named “Jorogumo” because of its size — is “relatively harmless to humans,” the GNN webpage states.
“They are generally docile and prefer living outside rather than inside peoples’ homes,” the news network continues. “Even if they do attack, their venom is relatively weak ... The spiders are also known to feast on pesky insects like mosquitoes and biting flies.”
However, there is a downside. The Joro spider can “disrupt local ecosystems by eating native spiders.”
“These are not just benign spiders coming to catch and kill bad things; these are pushing out native species and catching and killing whatever happens to get in their webs,” GNN reports David Coyle, a scientist and assistant professor at Clemson University’s Department of Forestry and Environmental Conservation, telling radio station WNBC. “Are they bad or good? It’s very nuanced depending on your perspective.”