Spiders In Seattle (vicinity)

[hopedelivers]

shadedtribulations I live in a ground end unit surrounded by mulch which is infested with ants and spiders . What I do to prevent the big invasion of spiders and ants into my place is I mix 1/3 bleach to 2/3 water. I go outside and spray all around my door frame and entrance. I then go from window to window and spray all around the frame and the inside of the frame near the glass. I then come inside and do the same to the inside windows and wola it works. I see an occasional ant and spider. The ones that come up my drain in my bathtub are wood spiders. Nasty looking things they look just like wood and scrape the tube like they are made of wood. My son was taking a shower the other day and he heard a noise and there it was a wood spider trying to climb out of the tube my son quickly grabbed a bottle of shampoo and squished the gross spider!!!

Bleach also helps on ant hills...just pour straight bleach into the and watch them come running out their hole and drop dead as quickly as they ran out. I had do this once when I stepped out onto my porch at my previous house and ants were all around the door frame. I ran and got my bleach and put it into an empty spray bottle and sprayed it on them and they all peeled off and feel to the floor of the porch .

I then took the bottle of bleach and poured it down the hole of the ant mound....Never had a problem after that. Believe me it really works!!!!

[Quantum]

Bleach works by releasing chlorine gas, which for some reason is still toxic to living organisms. Maybe someday it will no longer work.

But for now bleach is only effective for as long as it can give off chlorine gas. This happens in diminishing amounts over about 12 hours only.

I've been watching a TV show called "Infested!". At first I was alarmed that these people couldn't seem to solve these massive infestations of everything from ticks, bedbugs, spiders, roaches, snakes, scorpions, bats, squirrels, etc. But then I started realizing that I knew how to fix these problems, when the exterminators the people called just threw up their hands and left them high and dry. Although these infestations are disturbing that they can happen, seems to me alot of the 'unsolvable' aspect is for dramatic effect.

[swerver]

Originally Posted by kelly1922

Okay, I just read this thread. I have severe arachnophobia. I was scared to scroll down the pages for fear there would be a picture! In CA, I *rarely* saw more than a small house spider. One incident with a tarantula, one with a black widow, in 32 years. After moving to SC, I've had my share of horrifying encounters with wolf spiders in the last 7 years. I thought I would die from sheer fright! So planning our move to WA and thinking there were nothing more than small house spiders, just to read this thread and discover that's not the case after all, is devastating!!! Is it really that bad there? Surely it can't be as bad as the south?!

It's not that bad. There are more in the early fall, as in right now, thus this thread is firing up again. If you are that scared you can always just get an exterminator, have him come around every 3 months and you'll never see a thing in the house. But it basically is, like you said, "nothing more than small house spiders". These forums have a tendency to exaggerate, no matter the topic.

[kelly1922]

Originally Posted by swerver

It's not that bad. There are more in the early fall, as in right now, thus this thread is firing up again. If you are that scared you can always just get an exterminator, have him come around every 3 months and you'll never see a thing in the house. But it basically is, like you said, "nothing more than small house spiders". These forums have a tendency to exaggerate, no matter the topic.

Thank you!! I really do appreciate that; I'm relaxing a little now!

[Wynternight]

Originally Posted by hopedelivers

shadedtribulations I live in a ground end unit surrounded by mulch which is infested with ants and spiders . What I do to prevent the big invasion of spiders and ants into my place is I mix 1/3 bleach to 2/3 water. I go outside and spray all around my door frame and entrance. I then go from window to window and spray all around the frame and the inside of the frame near the glass. I then come inside and do the same to the inside windows and wola it works. I see an occasional ant and spider. The ones that come up my drain in my bathtub are wood spiders. Nasty looking things they look just like wood and scrape the tube like they are made of wood. My son was taking a shower the other day and he heard a noise and there it was a wood spider trying to climb out of the tube my son quickly grabbed a bottle of shampoo and squished the gross spider!!!

Bleach also helps on ant hills...just pour straight bleach into the and watch them come running out their hole and drop dead as quickly as they ran out. I had do this once when I stepped out onto my porch at my previous house and ants were all around the door frame. I ran and got my bleach and put it into an empty spray bottle and sprayed it on them and they all peeled off and feel to the floor of the porch .

I then took the bottle of bleach and poured it down the hole of the ant mound....Never had a problem after that. Believe me it really works!!!!

Wood Spider is another name for a Huntsman Spider (Sparassidae), which is not native to WA state. I imagine you're seeing the Giant Brown House Spider which I mentioned earlier in the thread.

[limebase]

I think you really only have to worry about spiders in the house if you live in a very woodsy area, or at least someplace with a yard or a basement. If you're in a condo, probably not as big an issue. The houses I was at where spider infestations were biggest were at my Grandma's house in a very rural area of Whidbey Island, and my home growing up in suburban Bellevue. There will be a month or two of no spiders, then other times where you can see one or more a day.

The types of spiders I generally see indoors are:

little blonde spiders - I don't know their name, but they're only about half an inch across, have very flat bodies, and they camouflage easily.

little blonde spiders with black backs (name unknown)- they look the same as the blonde spiders, except their body is black on top. They seem to have a fondness for kitchens and bathrooms, since I find them there most. I don't find either of these two particularly scary.

cellar spiders - they have a tiny body and really long, thin legs. Like a daddy-long-legs, but transparent. I never had them anywhere I lived, but they like to make big messy webs up in ceiling corners. They move slowly because they trip on their long legs :P They can get up to a 3 inch legspan

silky spiders - again, I don't know the name of these guys, but I find them the scariest-looking. They have a black abdomen that looks like brushed silk, and red-black, shiny legs. They're only about an inch across. I used to hardly ever ever see them, but I'm seeing them more and more often indoors.

house spiders - these are the massive, creepy giants that everyone's so scared of. They range in size from 1.5-3 inches. They are very dark gray/black/brown, and have long, hairy legs. They can appear anywhere, crawling across your floor, in your bathtub, in a corner of the ceiling. It's a good idea to always check your shoes before you put them on, since I've seen these buggers crawl out of them!

hobo spiders - I may have seen hobo spiders, based on the tunnel webs I'll sometimes see in cardboard boxes I haven't opened in years. I hear that they can be hard to identify, so I can't say for sure. There are also dark brown/black spiders that look like the house spiders, except that their legs are hairless, and they are 1-1.5 inches. I don't know if these are younger house spiders, or hobo spiders, or another type entirely.

Outdoors, there are also a lot of spiders. But probably the only ones you'll ever notice are the big, orange ones (I've heard a lot of different names for them: cross spider, garden spider, orb spider). They appear in summertime, and they build large webs. They get bigger and bigger through autumn, when they can get upward of two inches across, and have large round webs over a foot in size. These webs get very sticky late in the season, too. They are the bane of people who walk outdoors.

I remember as a child, one of my chores was to go outside in the morning waving a rake everywhere, to get rid of the webs. It's smart to carry a stick and wave it in front of yourself when walking though bushy areas or under trees. If you're walking or driving on a foggy day, you can see hordes of the webs all along the power lines (the water droplets make them visible).

[FriendlyTriton]

We used to get big hobo spiders inside the house every year just after school started. Maybe they go to their schools too, who knows. I got sick of it. Never bit but bad hugh adrenalin surprises. Took the following steps and now only see a small onewhen cleaning closets, getting ready to paint, etc.
Around the perimeter of the house, do these things. Use Great Stuff foam sealent to plug obvious holes. Move wood piles and other spider habitats as far from your abode as practical. Speay pyrethrin-based pesticide around exterior windows, door frames, ground contact line around house. Spray other places that are dry all year. You dont want to kill anything downstream from your dwelling so dont spray places that get wet.. Spray liberally. 2 cans for a 1600 square foot house ought to do. Use indoor/outdoor spray. Save some for inside. Spray areas that you suspect would be places where they would be. Most formulations work for 6 minths however 1 application ought to do for the year. Keep the inside of your house tidy. Pyrethrin based sprays are inexpensive and dont bother our dogs.

[FriendlyTriton]

Also use those sticky strips. You I vatch 1 or 2 small ones that way too.

[Nicomis]

Ah geez! I was really excited about my move, and then somebody had to dig this up. I really hate spiders. We obviously have plenty in Florida, but I never see them in my house due to our Cuban Brown Anole, and gecko infestation. They keep us pretty well bug free.

[Sandhillian]

I too was concerned when I first read this thread. I moved here from Puerto Rico where we had lots of horrible spiders (tarantulas, wolf, etc.) in our yard in spite of our plentiful geckos. Where we live now has a basement and is next to a hillside with open space so I thought we would have problems. However, after living here almost two years I have never seen anything other than a small house spider (which after dealing with tarantulas doesn't phase me a bit).