I was cleaning up a pile of old wooden fence railings in the backyard -- in the process, disturbing the many pillbugs, centipedes, carpenter ants and slugs that were calling the pile their home.
Lifting one board, I chanced upon a Dark Fishing Spider (Dolomedes tenebrosus).
While normally found near bodies of water, they can be found in upland sites. And, they are commonly confused with Wolf Spiders (Wolf Spiders have stockier legs and more hairy bodies).
This Fishing Spider measured close to 4 inches in length (Just for scale -- it is sitting on the four inch wide side of a length of rough-cut two-by-four).
And, it did not seem at all intimidated by me. Several times, as I tried to herd it into a nearby brush pile with a stick, it scurried up the stick toward my hand.
I turned over the remainder of the boards a little more slowly.
