Photographer found

Teresa Giacomi

Friday, October 24, 2008

The photographer who took these graphic images of a giant spider eating a bird has been discovered in Atherton, west of Cairns.

BREAKING NEWS EXCLUSIVE: The man who took the amazing photos of a spider eating a bird on the Tableland, west of Cairns, has been found. The images caused a media frenzy and sped around the world.

A 75-year-old retired Tableland man, amateur photographer and bird enthusiast, took the pictures that sparked an international media frenzy yesterday in his Tableland back yard, near Cairns, last week.

"It was an awful thing. The spider was just chewing into it's head," he told The Cairns Post.

See photos of the spider eating the bird

"The spider's head was going up and down, and it was gouging into him (the chestnut-breasted manikin) at the top of his beak. It was still wrapping it up.

"And then the spider just left it. It was like it was too big or something," the man said.

Spider experts said yesterday the photographs showed the orb injecting venom into the stunned bird.

But the photographer maintained that what he saw was a dead bird.

The photos were originally sent around via an email and, when picked up by Cairns.com.au, the story travelled all the world via the internet.

Cairns.com.au has received over 500,000 page views for the Spider Eating Bird story and photo gallery and have received comments from as far afield as Texas and New Jersey in America and from the UK.

The story has obviously captured the world's imagination.

For an exclusive interview with the photographer read The Weekend Post tomorrow.

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No hands, helmet or brains

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