Boris
Does anyone know if Boris was a Goliath Birdeater? He (it actually looks more like a she) was certainly big enough, and was the right colour. I should know. I used to have one as a pet.
Lest some reader be puzzled, allow me to point out that Boris is the giant spider in "The Wisdom of the Witch," the 1995 Christmas special. He/She appears as "Edwin" in the cast roster.
You had a Goliath Birdeater as A PET, you say, StormSworder? My hat's off to you. You were not allergic to it?
I read in Wikipedia that Theraphosa blondi do not normally eat birds but consume insects and other invertebrates. According to Wikipedia, the spider gets its name from reports in Victorian times from explorers who claim they saw one eating a hummingbird.
Despite popular belief, tarantulas do not have venom which can seriously endanger human life. My Goliath Birdeater Lilith (RIP) used to eat large insects (I saw her with three locusts in her mouth at once at one point) and I also sometimes gave her bits of chicken (cooked or raw are fine with spiders). I don't think I'd call any of the tarantulas I've had as pets "aggressive", although some of them (including Lilith) had hairs on their backs which they flick off with their back legs when frightened or annoyed, and the hairs can cause an itching/burning sensation if they come into contact with human skin. Nothing serious though, although I always made sure I wore rubber gloves when changing Lilith's bedding in case of dropped hairs.
I think people tend to judge a spider's venom by its size. Also, some people just assume any big hairy spider is a tarantula. There are a family of spiders called Brazilian Wandering Spiders (Phoneutria species). These actually live all over South America despite their name and they sometimes turn up in the UK in bananas. Phoneutria are dangerously venomous and are big enough to be mistaken for tarantulas (they're smaller than most tarantulas but they're massive monsters compared to any native British spider).
Regards