Poisonous spiders on school bus

By CATHERINE MASTERS

A nest of live redback spiders and their eggs survived a thorough dose of steam-cleaning then sat for several days on a North Shore yard in an imported bus.

Yesterday their luck ran out and they succumbed to a dose of toxic gas.

When staff at Bayes Coachlines in Albany discovered the little colony of poisonous Australians behind a panel as they checked the bus at the weekend, they called the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry's hotline.

The bus was not fumigated until yesterday and Fergus Small, MAF's general manager of quarantine services, said the spiders stood no chance of living through it this time.

"Methyl bromide fumigation will kill them, there's no doubt about it."

Methyl bromide is a poisonous gaseous compound used mainly as a fumigant against rodents, worms and insects.

Although bus company staff had got an answerphone message when they telephoned on Friday just after 5pm, MAF assessed the information they left and decided the spiders were unlikely to move from their dark, cosy spot behind the panel.

"There were quite a few eggs, there were quite a few adults, but they were fully self-contained in this area because of the panels and one thing and another," said Mr Small.

"The likelihood of them actually leaving en masse was very remote."

An employee at Bayes Coachlines said the bus, which had been imported from Australia and was to be used as a school bus next year, had been sitting in the yard for a week.

On Friday, when a mechanic parked the bus over the pit to look underneath it, he saw what he recognised as a redback spider.

The employee said a MAF official had told him there were at least two big nests in the chassis and the frame.

The bus had come to New Zealand on a container ship and had been inspected at the wharf. It had already been steam-cleaned because there had been soil on board.

Mr Small said: "But they were obviously in this little compartment where the steam and the water couldn't penetrate."

It was not unusual for spiders to come into the country inside imported vehicles, Mr Small said.

Redbacks are a close relative of the native New Zealand spider the katipo and, although unwelcome, are already established here.

"One of the worries is they are, I believe, starting to displace the katipo."

The female redback delivers a slow-acting toxin which can cause headaches, nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain and, rarely, paralysis and death.

The male redback is harmless and smaller than the female, whose abdomen is about the size of a pea.

Herald feature: Environment