Hundreds of tarantulas spotted near the German border

In the evening in the garage, lights on - and suddenly she's sitting there: tall, dark, hairy, in the middle of the floor. No web, no hiding place, just a spider that looks like it just crawled out of a horror movie. In Austria, such encounters with two unusual eight-legged creatures are currently increasing: the South Russian tarantula and the black-bellied tarantula.

More than 200 sightings of these two species have been reported since the beginning of September, 175 of which have been confirmed by experts. The animals are now also appearing in places where they were not previously registered. There is already talk of a “tarantula year”.

Particularly noteworthy: The South Russian tarantula was discovered in Tulln, Lower Austria - unusually far in the northwest of its previous distribution area and increasingly closer to the German border. None of these creatures have yet been observed in the wild in this country. But will Germany soon have to adapt to a new species of spider?

That's not entirely out of the question. A study in the “Journal of Insect Conservation” had already shown last year: Even in the Czech Republic, immediately north of Austria, there are indications that the impressive animals are on the rise again. The rising temperatures could help them.

The South Russian tarantula originally occurs in the vast, dry grasslands of Eastern Europe and Asia. From there it spread to Central Europe and is now considered the largest spider there, with its body up to four centimeters long.

Unlike many other spiders, it does not build webs, but rather digs tubes in the ground. It ambushes its prey - insects, other spiders and rarely even smaller rodents - and overwhelms them with its poisonous claws. Since it has no chewing tools, it uses a perfidious method to eat its paralyzed prey: it releases digestive enzymes into the prey until all of its internal tissue has liquefied. She then sucks the resulting food pulp out of the remaining shell of her victim.

It loves sunny, sandy-dry, sparsely vegetated conditions. The fact that it is currently appearing in garages or basements of all places has to do with the time of year. In autumn, the males look for a partner, the females look for sheltered hiding places in which to survive the winter - a search in which they can easily get lost.

Sunny, sandy, sparse – these same conditions are becoming increasingly common in Central Europe, according to the analyzes from 2025. The researchers reconstructed the distribution of the South Russian tarantula in the Czech Republic over almost a century: they evaluated 89 documented occurrences between 1924 and 2023 and compared them with historical weather data.

Juveniles require hot, dry summers

The result: In the 1920s to 1950s, the spider was repeatedly detected in the neighboring country to the east. However, it then disappeared almost completely there again for decades. Only since the early 2000s have the finds increased again. What the researchers noticed was that both peak phases coincided with unusually warm and dry summers.

The climate, they concluded, could have been a decisive factor in why the regional distribution changed. The temperatures have a significant influence on how well the young animals develop. In warm summers they grow faster and have a better chance of building up enough reserves until winter. On the other hand, if the summers remain cool and humid, this can slow down their development and reduce their chances of survival.

Such a return can also be observed in Austria: the South Russian tarantula was rare there for a long time, but it has only been seen more frequently again since the 2000s. And the second species, the black-bellied tarantula, is also currently spreading in the Alpine state. At up to two and a half centimeters it is slightly smaller, but also prefers warm, open land.

And in this country? So far there is no confirmed evidence. But the geographical development is revealing – it is moving increasingly closer to Germany. However, whether it can actually settle here does not just depend on the temperatures. Above all, it needs suitable, dry, barren places where it can dig its tubes into the ground. Dense forests or intensively farmed areas are out of the question.

The spiders are not dangerous anyway. As scary as both species may look, they are harmless to humans. As shy creatures, they usually run away. They can only bite if they feel cornered. A bite can hurt and the area can swell slightly. But nothing more.

So anyone who encounters one of them should not panic as if they had been bitten by a tarantula - in fact, in the Middle Ages it was believed that their bite could trigger a kind of dancing craze; their menacing appearance had always captured people's imagination. Instead, you should just do one thing: leave them alone.