Spiders invading Tucson area

TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — Things are already getting spooky this October. The word is going around that spiders are invading the Tucson area.

Many of you have shared on social media that you’ve recently started seeing more spiders.

Just around Matt Dunkel’s home he’s found five spiders. Around his Oro Valley neighborhood, he’s found three.

“It’s been crazy! It’s been awesome! There’s been spiders all over the place,” he said.

“Now we’ve just been seeing them everywhere so it’s been really kind of neat to see all the little friends just kind of hanging out in all the little different hotspots of the neighborhood,” said Dunkel.

Things are already getting spooky this October. The word is going around that spiders are invading the Tucson area.

Spiders in Tucson By: Reyna PreciadoPosted at 5:32 PM, Oct 13, 2022 and last updated 5:32 PM, Oct 13, 2022 TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — Things are already getting spooky this October. The word is going around that spiders are invading the Tucson area.

Many of you have shared on social media that you’ve recently started seeing more spiders.

Just around Matt Dunkel’s home he’s found five spiders. Around his Oro Valley neighborhood, he’s found three.

“It’s been crazy! It’s been awesome! There’s been spiders all over the place,” he said.

“They’re doing a job, they’re taking care of all the little bugs that can bother us and get icky. And what’s been cool is I’ve been able to take not only our daughter, but our son, who’s almost going to be five, and show him all the little cool things about how they build this web,” he said.

Dunkel has seen some black widows, but for the most part he’s seen orb weavers.

These spiders are the most common here around Tucson. Isaiah Vague with Arizona Pest Control said most like to build their webs around plants.

“The reason you’re going to see it that way is because they like to catch flying insects that aren’t going to be aware of their web as they’re passing through,” said Vague.

“Some of the different storm systems that we’ve had has actually caused an increase in the population of things that they would feed on, things that spiders would normally prey. And with that being said, anytime you have an increase food source and an increase water source, you’re going to produce more. It’s much easier to provide for your offspring if you have something to feed them,” he said.

If you’ve recently started seeing spiders like orb weavers, Vague said there’s no need to worry because they’re actually harmless. But many spiders could mean it’s time to call pest control, because they tend to go where they can find the most food.

That is hilarious to me...LOL, I can imagine he got all dressed for the occasion of catching a spider in a bowl...got the knit cap and all...jacket. But he is an amateur. He wasn’t wearing gloves, and didn’t have his sleeved duct taped.

I have a thing about spiders. When I was seven years old, I tried to crawl through a drainage pipe that went under a road. I could see the other side, so I thought it would be neat.

I wiggled my way in, and was about 15 feet in when I suddenly noticed the pipe was getting narrower. Next thing I knew, I couldn’t budge forward, and could only wiggle slightly backward.

I was lying on leaves, twigs and junk, arms out in front of me, and turned my head to say something to my older brother who was standing outside, when I saw that a huge cobweb and got squished all over my neck and shoulder.

And stuck right in it, was a big, huge, Daddy Longlegs. Just like the one on the Johnny Quest cartoon. Staring at me, with that single (I thought) eye.

That pipe immediately became skin-tight and I began to scream and wiggle in a most horrible fashion. Somehow, my brother wiggled in behind me, grabbed me by the ankles and pulled me out.

Next thing I knew, I was running down the middle of a residential street, screaming loudly, jumping in the air and twirling in a way that would have made a professional figure skater jealous, all the while beating my head and shoulders madly.

Every single time I glanced back, like a dog with tin cans tied to its tail, that Daddy Longlegs was still there...bouncing around, just within my field of view.

My brother got it off me, and even though I do not remember how I knew, I somehow found out that damned Daddy Longlegs was a corpse stuck in the web. It was one of my most frightening childhood experiences.

To this day, I harbor an irrational fear when I feel or see one on my body. I cannot kill them...they ARE interesting, and I find them fascinating, but...they still bring out some kind of primal fear in my gut, if even for a fleeting fraction of a second if one is on me.

Another time, I was driving down the road at night, and...a little itty bitty spider begins to lower itself from the ceiling of my car...right...in front of my nose.

So here I am, driving down a twisty New England road doing about 45 mph, at night, and I am completely fixated on this spider about three inches from the front of my face...inching slowly down towards my crotch.

I cannot take my eyes off of it for a second to look at the road. Just as I was coming to grips with the situation, doesn’t the damn thing just DROP and disappear into my lap.

I damn near wrecked my car. But I always wondered how my face looked to the spider...kind of fisheye distorted, bug eyed and crosseyed, with a great gaping black mouth slowly opening to reveal a waving uvula at the back of my throat as I yelled.

And all this isn’t because I am squeamish...I lived in the Philippines, and they had dang near every variety of bizzare huge beetle with enormous mandibles like Tiger Beetles, Rhinocerous Beetles, and the prized and rare, Ox Beetles. They had lizards, geckos, snakes, monkeys, boars, monitor lizards and God knows what else...but it was only the spiders that freaked me out.

BTW...I DO know Daddy Longlegs aren’t really spiders, and I DO know they are completely beneficial and harmless, but...still don’t like em.

"Just around Matt Dunkel’s home he’s found five spiders. Around his Oro Valley neighborhood, he’s found three."

Amateur hour! If he wants to see spiders I'll show him hundreds of brown recluses in my attic tomorrow.

They won't be there long, though, now that I got the raccoon out. I've found that my fearless teen assistants can vacuum up 100 years worth of brown recluses in about 20 minutes (they already did the basement), after which I'll call in the pros to give it a good spraying down.

I had a choice between living amongst Democrats in the big city or living amongst raccoons and spiders in rural American. I chose the raccoons and spiders.

FUN FACTOID: I've read from multiple sources that only 15% of people have any reaction to brown recluse bites.

Wow, look at all the replies. Because spiders.

Mr K used to kill everything. When I first moved in here, He was always killing spiders and whatever got into the house.

I showed him how I make friends with spiders and now he’s friends with them, too. The other day he said he gave a spider a drink of water - he was all excited, like a little kid. If there’s a spider in the house, it will usually look me up because it knows I’ll give it a drink.

Hornets have been trying to get in the house because the weather is getting cold. They’re a little more troublesome but I just put a little dish with some wine in it outside and that keeps them out there. Wasps and hornets like a drink.

To keep ants out, when I first start seeing them in the springtime I take about a cup of sugar and pour it on the ground somewhere on the property away from the house. They start going there and leave the house alone. You can tell when they’re out of sugar because they start coming back into the house.

I think that’s better than putting poison everywhere.

Spiders are fairly intelligent for being so small and their behavior is interesting.

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