It’s an arachnophobe’s worst nightmare… spiders literally raining from the sky, falling into everything and leaving a debris of web. That was what many experienced recently in the Australian city of Goulburn. (See amazing photos from the Sydney Morning Herald.) This isn’t the first time such a thing has happened either. This video shows an incident two years ago in Brazil.
https://youtu.be/htSDlXzWV-w?t=1m17s
While bizarre, this is a natural event when a large population of spiders migrates from one area to another, using a bit of web to catch the wind and fly them to a new home. Texas also had a migration in 2013.
Spiders are generally under-appreciated creatures that are often used for their fear-factor in movies. In reality, spiders consume a vast number of pests that invade the home and farm. In fact, a single spider can eliminate about 2,000 insects in a year (according to this spider fact page from the National Geographic Society).
Yes, they are weird and alien. Their lifestyle is gruesome. We’d rather have a rain of spiders than a rain of jellyfish any day.