Yes, it is possible that someone might find a brown recluse spider in Califor- nia. It’s also possible someone could win the California state lottery grand prize by buying just one ticket.
MYTH #6:
If You Find A Spider In Your House, You Should Put It Back Outside.
pended in mid-air, these webs are made of radial strands of silk that look like spokes of a wagon wheel connected by numerous concentric circular silk strands.
Tin, flat sheet webs are the most com- mon type of webs we see in the Orange County area. Sheet webs can be found low to the ground in shrubs, trees, and between blades of grass. Messy and haphazardly built cobwebs are also very common and are often found inside and around structures in our area.
You can find an abundance of orb weaver webs in the tropics but, even there, they are rarely in the majority.
MYTH #5:
If Te Spider Is Brown, It Has To Be A Brown Recluse!
Just because you found a brown spider in your closet, doesn’t mean that it is a brown recluse. Tere are more than 3,000 species of spiders in North Amer- ica, and many of them are brown.
Ask any arachnologist, entomologist, agriculture commissioner, or university researcher in California and they will all tell you the same thing: Tere are no populations of brown recluse spiders liv- ing in California.
Te common name “brown recluse spi- der” refers to one species of spider, the Loxosceles recluse. Tis spider lives in the central Midwest: Nebraska south to Texas and eastward to southernmost Ohio and north-central Georgia.
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Some people think it is an act of kind- ness: When they find a spider inside of their house, they take it outside and place it on the lawn. Unfortunately, that’s like taking a wild animal that has lived its entire life in the zoo and setting it free in the jungle.
A majority of house spiders have adapted to living indoors, where the climate is comfortable and they are free from most predators. When you take them out of their protective in- door habitat and set them free in an environment that they are not used to, most will perish rather quickly. When you see a spider in your home and you don’t want to harm it, prob- ably the best thing for you to do is to leave it alone.
If having spiders in your home is not your style, you need to start a regular routine of removing all spider webs with brushes and vacuums. A good way to help keep spiders out of your home is by installing weather strip- ping on your doors and making sure that your window screens are in good shape. You should also seal any gaps in floorboards, cracks in walls or other holes where spiders can gain access. Also, take a few minutes and inspect things before you bring them into your home. It doesn’t hurt to check. Tat old box of Halloween decorations from the garage may be full of spiders.
MYTH #7:
Te Daddy-Longlegs Is Poisonous, But Its Fangs Are Too Short To Bite Humans.
Tis tale has been around for many years, but there are no facts to support
it. Tere are two unrelated groups of arachnids that are called “daddy-long- legs.”
Opiliones are commonly called dad- dy-longlegs, harvestmen, or opil- ionids. Most people won’t ever see these unless they are turning over piles of logs or rocks. Tese are not true spiders. Tey don’t produce webs and they don’t have venom of any kind. For this species, we certainly know the myth is false.
Te animal which many biologists call daddy-longlegs belongs to the spider family Pholcidae.
Tey are also known as cellar spiders. Tese spiders make their messy webs out of silk and are especially plenti- ful in places like cellars. Currently, there are no records of a pholcid spi- der biting a human and causing any detrimental reaction. Tere are also no toxicological studies testing the lethal- ity of pholcid venom on any mammal.
Some say that a pholcid’s fangs are too short to penetrate human skin. Tat argument doesn’t go very far because the brown recluse has a similar fang structure and we know it is able to bite humans. Te difference may be that the brown recluse has stronger muscles for penetration. Yes, you’ll probably continue to hear this myth spread about daddy-longlegs spiders, but it is certainly not based on any known facts.
Now that these myths have been debunked, you can finally enjoy all those spooky spiders and alarming arachnids this Halloween — even if it’s just the fake variety found in a haunted house.
This article was written and submitted by Terry Singleton of Termite Terry Pest Control, Inc.
September / October 2017
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