[Shop-talk] Spiders!

[Bob Spidell]

My mom lives in the country, so we gets lots of all kinds of bugs, 
including black widow spiders. I tried a 'wasp & hornet' spray on a BW 
the other day, and it zapped her good (dunno if you'd want to use it in 
the house, though; maybe if you get desperate). Most spiders, I think, 
are carnivorous, feasting on other beasties, so if you can remove the 
food sources they sometimes pack up and move. I sprayed 
diazinon--remarkably, I think it's still available in California--the 
other day on a cockroach infestation, and it knocked them back pretty 
good (at least for a while).

On 10/3/2020 7:44 AM, Jim Franklin wrote:
> My house is a split entry, and the "basement" has been finished. The left 1/3 is the garage and I've sealed it off as best I can from the other 2/3, but spiders are still getting in. Hundreds. Every time I vacuum them all up, it scatters the ones that were hiding and seems to breed more.
>
> The "basement" is ground level out front and about 2-3 feet underground in back. There is 4' of foundation wall and 4' of stud wall. It isn't completely finished so there are probably a few small holes where things can crawl under the siding, through the wall and into the basement. I certainly expect a few spiders but this is ridiculous. They are all the same 2 types - a very tiny gray one and a 1.5" gray one. I thought they might be reproducing faster than I could vacuum them but I read it takes a year for them to hit reproductive age.
>
> I'm in MA, in the suburbs, and this house was not cleaned for the 40 years the previous owner lived in it. I've been in it for 2 years. Could I still be dealing with his infestation or are they coming from somewhere else? Most importantly how do I stop them? I almost can't have people over. They are in every corner of every room. I'd rather implent physical measures than chemical.
>
> As an afterthought, oddly the garage doesn't have that many. Maybe an average number.
>
> thanks,
> jim
>