• Question: is it true that in your lifetime, you swallow about 8 spiderss?!

    Asked by zoemcfly111 to Mike, Tim, Tom on 5 Jul 2012.
    • Photo: Tim Stephens

      Tim Stephens answered on 5 Jul 2012:

      I’ve heard stories that you swallow spiders whilst you’re asleep since they sometimes crawl across your face. I don’t know if it’s true or not – how would you go about finding out? Can you think of an experiment?

    • Photo: Tom Lister

      Tom Lister answered on 5 Jul 2012:

      Who told you that? I normally just throw them out of the window.

      I have heard the swallowing spiders in your sleep thing, which I imagine could be true. You are also likely to swallow lots of (little) spiders (and other bugs) with your food, especially if you are fond of picnics like me. Things like flour mites or cheese mites are eaten all of the time (and mites are closely related to spiders). Finally, there are rumours about bugs in processed foods too, but getting a number out of these would be very difficult.

      All in all, I think 8 is an underestimate

Comments