Giant spiders from Japan could colonise the US East Coast, from New York to Georgia
- The palm-sized jōro spiders are believed to have arrived in the US from shipping containers around 2013
- While little is known about the biology or physiology of the species in this new range, they do not seem to harm local ecosystems, researchers say
Joro spiders, an invasive species from Japan, could spread through most of the east coast of the United States, which spans from Maine down to New York and Florida, according to a new report.
The palm-sized arachnids first showed up in the US around 2013, says the report from the University of Georgia, and the spiders have since become a familiar sight in the Peach State. They were believed to have arrived from shipping containers.
Now the rest of the Eastern Seaboard could get caught up in their web.
The creatures – which are yellow, blue-black and red, and can grow to almost 8cm (3 inches) long – have colonised much of Japan, the researchers said, and a similar climate could make the Eastern US spider central.
“Just by looking at that, it looks like the Joros could probably survive throughout most of the Eastern Seaboard here, which is pretty sobering,” said Andy Davis, a research scientist in the Odum School of Ecology and one of the study’s authors.
Little is known about the biology or physiology of this species in this new range.
But the good news, was that the spiders did not seem to harm local ecosystems, Davis said.