Tips for warding off spiders?

Watchful said:
Okay, I admit to be the first guy to push this thread off the wheels.

Spiders, snakes, etc.? No problem. There's nothing, really, to be scared of, and both are excellent hunters who help keep the nasty bug populations down. A couple of spiders here and there in dark corners of your house, and a snake or two outside your house, and your pest problems go away. Good things to have.

But...and fortunately, I know I can trust a bunch of sarcastic, teasing near-strangers on the internet when I confess this...but centipedes.

Eeeeheheheeeyeweyewyeweeeheeh. Millipedes don't bother me a bit, and are actually fascinating to watch moving along like buses on a roadway, but the centipedes, with their spiky legs and fangs, oozing out from under bark and leaves... well. I'll leave it as eeeeheheheeeyeweyewyeweeeheeh.

No likey. He can be the nicest centipede, too; a nice family man, with a few kids and nice, kept-up home, maybe a nice pill bug as a pet, with a good forestry job...he's still gonna get 175 pounds of boot slamming down on him from me. And I'm so sorry. But the boot is coming anyway.
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Saw one about a foot long in Mexico a few years back (he met a nice big rock...a couple of times). I've heard they'll make you sick and when they grab on to you you'll most likely lose the skin they've grabbed onto. No thanks.

On spiders: We leave the little jumpers alone in the house so they can get the bugs, but if they get too big they're put out of the house or they go for a Land of the Lost ride with the Tidey Bowl Man.

Out doors I leave em alone, don't do much camping so I'll have to read on and see what else others have to say.
 
funny thing about brown recluses is sometimes you do'nt feel the bite.years back i went to trash out a house so i could clean the carpets. that evening i had a bump on my thigh & told my wife to dig out the sticker & she said nothing there. by the 2nd morning after red streaks were running up leg & lymph nodes under arm were swollen, went to dr. to see about the sticker & he said spider bite. had to take some potent injections & pills. ran a fever for 36 hrs but bite was'nt sealed 4 months later. inlaw popped out the core & all was well.
 
I've only really had a problem with them once. We setup camp right at dark, got a fire going and man they were suddenly everywhere, hundreds. Tried throwing some embers down at the rocks they were mainly coming out of, didn't seem to help much once they cooled off. We just dealt with it for the rest of the evening, lots of standing and stomping from what I remember. We had full tents so no problems once we hit the sack. But out of all the times I've been out hiking\canoeing in my life, that was the only time it was any sort of problem, so in general I would say it's no big deal unless you have a specific fear of them.

I definitely think more about walking face first into a web with a big fella on it. I always keep an eye out and usually a hiking pole up in front of me when I'm off trail.
 
DennisStrickland said:
funny thing about brown recluses is sometimes you do'nt feel the bite.years back i went to trash out a house so i could clean the carpets. that evening i had a bump on my thigh & told my wife to dig out the sticker & she said nothing there. by the 2nd morning after red streaks were running up leg & lymph nodes under arm were swollen, went to dr. to see about the sticker & he said spider bite. had to take some potent injections & pills. ran a fever for 36 hrs but bite was'nt sealed 4 months later. inlaw popped out the core & all was well.
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Got bit by what was probably a brown recluse when I was 8 on the ankle. Same thing, never saw the spider or felt the bite, noticed the bite and red streak the next day, then just suddenly got crazy sick throwing up, really high fever ect. Had to spend the night in the hospital, but bounced back after only a few days so maybe it wasn't a brown recluse, I don't really know enough about spiders to say, but it was definitely a spider with strong venom in the area of the eastern US.
 
years back i had a big wolf spider take residence in my house. i left him alone to clean up any bettles & crickets. one morning i wasa on the phone & my blue heeler saw the guest under an end table--went to check & jumped back after nose was bit. next dog about 90 lbs was going to show the heeler he could handle it ,same scenario. so big morky [130 lbs] --alpha dog goes over to be the big hero & gets the same treatment. was on phone with ex & laughing told her a spider kicked the s--t out of 3 dogs.
 
Friendly spiders dont bother me. In fact I am rather fond of jumping spiders, cute little buggers. But I have a big fear of the poisonous ones, my grampa was bitten by a brown recluse and even though it happened 15 years ago, I can still see the damage in my minds eye.

When I was in the boy scouts(that lasted a month), we were at camp and we came back to our wall tent and every surface was covered in daddy long legs. Thank god for mosquito nets.

happyspidero.jpg
 
I didn't feel it when the brown recluse got me but I felt it when they had to go digging the dead stuff out of my arm three times. I've got plenty of pictures of the damage but it is enough to turn your stomach.
 
I just pick them up, look at them, and gently toss them away - and I've never been bitten. I feel like people's fear of spiders is unwarrented.

'course I've never encountered a brown recluse or black widdow, much less any of those australian spiders
 
I was picking up a load of steel and the guy in the next dock was standing at the back of his trailer as i walked to mine. He looked like he had just gone a round or two with Mike Tyson. I asked (politely) what happened to his face and he explained that he had been sleeping in his tractors sleeper cab earlier in the day waiting for his load time appt. and woke up with a spider on his nose that bit him when he tried to brush it off. It bit him between his eyes.
In a short time, I watched his eyes swell nearly shut and his entire face became swollen, and a "hole" developed in his skin between his eyes. You could have stuck a pen in the hole and it would have stayed there.
I told him there was a hospital a few miles away but he said he would wait until he got back home 400 miles away. When he left, he was holding one eye open with his fingers to drive.
 
Brown recluse are nothing to mess with. Got me at the ankle and my foot was round like a club. Red and blue streaks uo the leg. Kills the flesh at wound site, still numb there to this day. Good news is that you wont feel the bite. They are also not aggressive but will bite if stuck in the folds of your clothes or trapped against the skin.
 
centepedes amaze me.(and freak me out) we get 'em at work 6-10 inches long every year. one of these days i'm taking one home. anything that eats vertebrates is cool, in my book.
 
August West said:
OK, I'll bite, then why did you ask? And what gnarly spiders are in VA, I live right across the line in NC maybe you know something I don't. Chris
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Slight difference between fear and dislike.

and as several people have pointed out, some of them are dangerously poisonous.
 
Joben said:
Slight difference between fear and dislike.

and as several people have pointed out, some of them are dangerously poisonous.
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Not meaning to be offensive or disrespectful, just making sure I was tracking.

Yeah, 2 are poisonous, much more likely to die of a heart attack, come to think of it, I have never heard of a spider bite killing anyone.

Enjoy the woods and don't worry about it, mosquitos and noseeums are much more of a problem in the woods than spiders. Chris
 
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