Violin Spider Bite

This spider is also called the Brown Recluse Spider. It often hides in boxes that you store away the the basement. This bite can cause you to lose an arm or leg. The picture shows what the bite looked like and what the spider looks like. My wife saw the spider land on me one day (she has a photographic memory and acute vision) and tried to tell me before I wiped it off of my arm.  Too late, the spider bit me and in a day my arm swelled but I did not get the necrosis shown on the picture on the left so I did not need surgical excision of the bite venom. This is a dangerous bite, but other than swelling and a fever, I did OK but it caused pain for about 3 days and it took a week for the swelling to go away.  Some people have been known to die or lose an arm or leg from such a spider bit. This happened to me in Los Angeles, California but the spider is wide spread in the United States. The patient in the photo shows that a surgeon removed the area of the bite because the skin died (necrosis) and this surgery was needed.