An American man has let deadly spiders walk all over his bare hands in a bid to prove they are not as dangerous as people may think.
The man, who identifies himself only as "Orlo", places a black widow spider and a brown recluse spider in a bucket and then submerges his hands, leaving only his fingertips exposed for the spiders to walk on.
But he may be exaggerating just how brave his stunt is, with Tim Faulkner, the operations manager at Australian Reptile Park admitting it is a "very calculated" set up.
"He's put the spiders in the water so they're swimming but if he were to pick one of the spiders up by the back and put it on his hand it would bite him," Mr Faulkner told ninemsn.
"By putting the spiders in water and then putting his hand up, they're not in attack mode. They're just happy not to be drowning."
But Mr Faulkner agrees with the Orlo's message that "spiders don't bite you just out of spite", despite his dangerous method of getting it across.
Although very few people die from spider bites, they will attack when aggravated, including if you sit on them, step on them or put on a shirt that they are resting inside.
The black widow is northern America's answer to the redback spider.
Its bite releases a neurotoxin which affects a victim’s brain by shutting down organs and neurological system if the bite is left untreated.
Mr Faulkner described the brown recluse as the equivalent of Australia’s white-tailed spider and a "nasty little bugger" because of its necrotic toxin which, if released, will attack skin and muscles and kill the tissue immediately around the bite.
But the chance of death from either spider is very small, according to Mr Faulkner.
"If you leave them alone, they will leave you alone."
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