Look-A-Like or the Real Thing

Tim and I are not spider experts even though we've had a lot of run-ins recently. Arachnologists or not, we are confident we found the real thing. Take a look...

What we found on our grill cover:


(this postmortem picture is out of focus; however, the hourglass is visible)


A real (southern) black widow:


A few facts about black widows:
(for more info click HERE)
-typically prey on a variety of insects
-venom is extremely potent (15x more than a rattlesnake)
-females are larger than males, though both are rather small spiders
-between 1950 and 1990 only 63 reported deaths nationwide