I bet Robert the Bruce never had this in mind

[Wowbagger]

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/video/2014/oct/16/tropical-spider-burrows-mans-skin-bali-video

 

[Wombat]

Uuuurgh! Alien lives....

[Canardly]

There are some nasty things out there.

[spesh]

I'll just leave these here...

http://www.snopes.com/horrors/insects/balispider.asp

http://io9.com/no-a-spider-did-not-burrow-under-a-mans-skin-and-live-1647314968

Stuff like this really does make you wonder how much fact-checking even supposedly reputable news media organisations do before posting a story.

[clarion]

The Guardian does point out that it is an unverified report, and gives a link to Snopes. noting that the account has been doubted.

[Wowbagger]

OTOH

Marie Herberstein, Head of the Department of Biological Sciences at Macquarie University in New South Wales, doesn't fully exclude the possibility that this could be a spider, though she writes, "I have never heard of any spider to crawl or exist under the skin or integument of any other creature (there are no parasites amongst spiders)." But she also suspects it may be a different animal. She told us, "My initial reaction is that this is a mite (also 8-legged) rather than a spider, and mites are renown[ed] for this type of behaviour, such as in scabies. Let's see what the identification brings."

So the species is questioned rather than the lesion.

Did anyone Scottish have any memorable quote about mites?

Apart from this one...

We mite win on Thursday but then again we mite not!

[Tigerrr]

looks very much like a jellyfish sting to me. Burrowing critters are not usually spiders but more specialist skin drillers, with the appropriate mouthparts etc to bore through flesh.

[Asterix, the former Gaul.]

Almost certainly the damage was done by the lava of a fly.  I reckon he swallowed the spider afterwards.

IIRC Robert the Bruce was killed by leprosy.

[Zipperhead]

On the other hand... I am *never* going to Guyana

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[Ian H]

On the other hand... I am *never* going to Guyana

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My dearly beloved would coo over that like many would over a puppy.

[Mr Larrington]

On the other hand... I am *never* going to Guyana

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ISTR a Mr Volio fotp saying how the roads in Big Bend National Park were full of basking taranshulas.  Fortunately when I was there last month the taranshulas weren't.

[mrcharly-YHT]

On the other hand... I am *never* going to Guyana

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Good eating on one of them things.

"Grandma, we've got company. Throw another * on the barbie!"

[Andrij]

On the other hand... I am *never* going to Guyana

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I know a few people who would need sedation and/or therapy if they saw that.  Good thing for them they're in my good books (at the moment).

[Mr Larrington]