What kind of spider is this?

[JM Ver. 2.0]

I used to work with an exterminator. Bug bombs won't kill spiders. But it will kill every other bug out there.

Also, look up the Hobo Spider. Same venom as the Brown, but all over Colorado.

[roberth]

It looks like one of the funnel spiders I see when I go hiking around here. I drop grasshoppers in their webs and wait for the spider to come out. They are really quick and some of them are big.

When spiders come in my house I catch them and put them outside, they are good to have around because they keep the other bugs in check.

[O2HeN2]

Had a friend in college who used to catch and keep the things in jars for some odd reason.

Me too. Wouldn't have happened to be Cal Poly back in the late 70s, would it?

O2

[pdr240]

http://whatsthatbug.com
lotsa pictures and more

[BUC303]

When spiders come in my house I catch them and put them outside, they are good to have around because they keep the other bugs in check.

^
I used to do this but with more and more black and brown widow spiders showing up I had to start killing them because I have 2 small children running around. I have noticed an increase in bugs in one summer, pretty crazy.

OP I would be willing to bet that is not a recluse, they have a different body shape without the bulbous abdomen. Looks more like a black house spider or something.

[HoneyBadger]

In July I had two wolf spider looking beasts in my house. They were both about an inch long, and were very aggressive. When you got within a few feet, they would raise their front two legs and hold their ground. I'll see if I can find the picture that my wife took.

[xring]

My understanding is that the brown recluse has no web and uses speed to catch its prey. They run around at night. If they show up in Colorado they have hitched a ride. If you want to see whats running around at night glue traps are a must.
One of the things i have gotton real paranoid about is buying used monitors,, stereo equipment computers, ecetera off ebay. spiders and eggs. Bedbugs and eggs. Roaches and eggs. I buy new.

[skortch]

I've gotten to the point where I either put most spiders outside or leave them be. I figure the reduced fly/mosquito/bug population is worth putting up with some heebie jeebies, especially in these West Nile days.

The main exception is Black Widows. Haven't seen any hobos or recluses, though they tend to be confused with other harmless spiders. (The recluse looks a lot like the common funnel weaver house spider, including body shape and a fiddle-like pattern on the cephalothorax. The OP photo doesn't look like a recluse, as others have said - legs look too stubby and the abdomen looks too large.)

OK, the other exception to the let-live rule is if they are crawling on me or dangling at eye level. Then I have to be in a very forgiving mood for them to avoid the big squish.

[brutal]

A friend of my wife was bitten (in Colorado) by a brown recluse. So, rare or not, they are around here.

When I first met here she was still recovering. She got bit in the calf and it had eaten away most of the flesh and muscle. It was pretty gruesome looking. She was wheelchair bound for a while.

A fellow soldier got bitten by one on the ass when we were going through field excercises in BNOC at Ft. Riley, KS. Poor guy didn't know what got him until the flesh started rotting. As I recall, they got him into the hyperbaric oxygen chamber, but since most treatments are ineffective, he still lost a sizable piece of his gluteus maximus and obviously had to be dropped from the course.

[xring]

Also, look up the Hobo Spider. Same venom as the Brown, but all over Colorado.

I did look it up because I like to know about small things that crawl around that have the potential of killing me or causing a chunk of my body to rot off, From CSU ext.

"A special spider issue is the "hobo spider" and its purported danger to humans. This originated from an unfortunate study that suggested this spider could cause slow healing wounds similar to those known to be sometimes produced following a brown recluse bite. This report received extremely wide distribution in popular press and the internet. However, subsequent research has demonstrated that this original report was erroneous and based on unsupportable anecdotal evidence. The hobo spider is now recognized as >not< being a dangerous species. It is a harmless funnel weaver spider and is now found in many areas of the state."