How To Get Rid Of Spiders In House

Spiders can be a nuisance in and around your home. While they may not cause structural damage to your home or spread diseases the way some pests do, they can certainly be annoying and even dangerous. Certain spider bites are venomous and can cause severe reactions. These reactions are usually most severe in children or the elderly, or people with compromised immune systems. It's no wonder many people are looking for natural remedies to get rid of spiders in their homes.

There are chemicals and pesticides used commonly by exterminators that can kill spiders, but these are often dangerous for your family and pets, and not environmentally friendly since these pests are actually important and are needed to balance our ecosystem. Unlike other pests, spiders do not carry disease-causing bacteria. Arachnids actually help control the spread of disease by eating bugs like mosquitoes, cockroaches, and fleas that can give diseases to humans.

5 Ways to Get Rid of Spiders

The methods we will explore include:

Remove their food and shelter sources
Clean your basement
Use a spider deterrent
Prevent a spider infestation before it starts
Prepare for spider season

1) Get Rid of Their Food Source and Shelters

In the case of spiders, not only will a clean home provide fewer places for them to hide, but it will also make it less likely that small insects will be around for them to eat. Spiders rely on other insects for food . Without a reliable food source, and with fewer hiding spots, it will be harder for them to stay.

Some web-building spiders tend to make their home high up in the corners of the ceiling. Take a look around, often these webs can be sucked up in a vacuum cleaner or at least knocked down with an extending duster.

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2) Clean and Tidy Up Your Basement

Your basement is the perfect hiding place for the most common house spiders.

They would much rather live outside in an ideal environment, but in many circumstances, they find their way to your basement in search of food and shelter. They like cool, dark areas, and feel most at home in places that contain dust and clutter, where they can easily take shelter from predators. Insects are also fond of basements — offering spiders an abundant food supply. Your main living quarters aren't as attractive to these eight-legged uninvited guests, because they don't like noise and movement.

They are also attracted to living conditions that contain moisture, like water heaters, windows, and drains, so don't be surprised if you see spider webs around openings.

3) Use a Spider Deterrent

Deterrents, like Stay Away® Spiders , prevent spiders from staying in your home by emitting a scent that spiders dislike, but is pleasant to humans. This is an important step in getting rid of these pests as well as preventing them in the future.

Spider infestations are often less obvious than other pest problems. Many species are nocturnal, so they don't move around much during the day, making it hard to locate them. They prefer to hide out in dark, undisturbed places so a little searching might be required to locate them.

Stay Away® Spiders is the simplest way to repel 8-legged creepy crawlies from infested areas and prevent them from coming back. It's made from fast-acting, plant-based ingredients. Our combination of rosemary, lemongrass, and citronella oils combined with natural plant fibers repels spiders for 30 days. Simply place a pouch anywhere webs or spiders are noticed.

4) Keep Spiders Out Before They Come Inside

A good way to prevent spiders from getting into your home is to make sure you don't have an environment around your house that attracts them in the first place. They often make their homes outside in plants, piles of leaves or wood, or dark undisturbed places like old tires or buckets. Having these things right next to your house makes it more likely that one of these critters will wander in. Create distance between these things and your house.

Identifying and sealing possible entry points is also important to keeping spiders out. This could involve sealing small holes, baseboards, or cracks with caulk, and making sure doors and windows close tightly without any gaps. Consider cleaning up any old cobwebs and using a spider repellent before you seal up any cracks, to make sure any unwanted guests make their exit first!

5) Prepare for Spider Season

In general, spider season is actually fairly short and takes place in the autumn months. This is the time of year when most species are mating. And while you might not be able to tell by looking at one crawling across the ceiling, nearly 80% of the ones you see are male . This is because male spiders are actively seeking mates while females tend to stay where they are, typically for their entire lives, and usually in the safe dark spaces inside your home.

After they mate, the baby spiders will begin to come out of their egg sacs towards the beginning of spring. Luckily, when they hatch, they wander away and usually leave your home. But a few stragglers might stick around, so keep an eye out!

The best thing you can do during this season is to be more vigilant about keeping your house clean and vacuuming often. Clean in the corners, crevices, the basement, the garage, in your windows, behind cardboard boxes, junk rooms, and anywhere else they might think they're safe.

Cleaning the outside of your home is just as important. Clean and check places outside such as outdoor lights, windowsills, woodpiles, and all entry points.

Home Remedies for Spiders

There are other DIY solutions people often try to control infestations including:

Using vinegar
Using essential oils
Natural vibrations as a deterrent

Strong scents and vibrations can interfere with spider's sophisticated senses, making it hard for them to sense and catch prey. If the annoyances linger, they will be forced to take off in search of a new, more welcoming home.

Vinegar

Spiders dislike vinegar. You can use a mix of white vinegar and water in a spray bottle for areas like the garage or outdoors. These remedies can work but require frequent reapplication. But the scent of something like peppermint essential oil might be a little nicer in your home!

Essential Oils

The following are natural scents that help to repel spiders:

Eucalyptus oil
Peppermint oil
Lemongrass
Citronella
Rosemary

Grab an essential oil that spiders don't like and mix it with water. Spray corners, pantries, and anywhere else you've noticed webs or spiders. It's important to repeatedly spray your mixture, so the scent is always lingering, otherwise, they will return.

Why do they despise these refreshing scents? Spiders have sensory organs on their legs , meaning they actually taste and smell with their legs. By walking on surfaces that are coated in the scent of strong essential oils, they end up tasting them too, which is uncomfortable so they take off. It's similar to being at the dentist's office when peppermint toothpaste and fluoride are forced in your mouth; it's natural to want to run away!

Vibrations

Vibrations from sounds truly annoy spiders. Continuous vibrations that aren't related to a bug landing on their web, agitate them. Loud continuous sounds, like music, can take away their ability to detect prey, and they might think the vibrations are coming from predators. To be safe, they end up running away in fear.

Spiders tend to make their homes in quiet, low traffic areas without a lot of new, fresh scents such as attics, basements, sheds, and storage areas. Enjoying music throughout your home not only adds a warm vibe to the room, it signals these pests to move out!

Other Common Deterrent Methods We Don't Recommend

There are two other methods often used for spider removal, however, we do not recommend them.

Spider Traps

Spider traps are only effective if you place them in areas where they are traveling. Only the unlucky one that walks across a glue trap will be caught and the others that avoid it will remain. Traps are not usually the most effective method of pest control.

Setting traps around your home lures spiders using an aroma that is pleasant to them but may not be nice for humans or pets. You also need to dispose of the traps when they are spent, an often unpleasant task as they can be full of dead spiders. Traps usually won't completely eradicate your problem, either, as they don't contain any insecticide or repellent.

We do not recommend this method for effective spider control.

Poison

Some people may be inclined to look for chemical pesticides and insecticides to get rid of pests. These methods are rarely effective when it comes to spiders. Most foggers are not designed to get rid of spiders. Residual insecticides can be used, but these usually only work if they walk directly through the chemicals after they have been sprayed. If they walk around the sprayed area, the insecticide will not affect it at all.

While spider poisons sometimes use an aroma to attract them, it is often necessary to remove their food source before this method is effective. Once they do take the poison, they often don't die immediately but instead return to their shelter, leaving numerous dead spiders around your home.

Most pest control sprays or foams can expose your family to scary chemicals and can be harmful to kids and pets. It is not unheard of for a curious dog to ingest a poison and need immediate medical assistance.

We do not recommend this method.

Final Thoughts About Spider Infestations

Don't have time to constantly concoct home remedies and routinely spray oils throughout the house? We understand.

The most effective strategy for getting rid of spiders involves removing inviting habitats from around your home, cleaning thoroughly, placing natural repellents, and then making sure the house is well sealed. If you take these steps, they will quickly identify your home as an impossible place to live, and you can enjoy a spider-free home!

Botanical pest control products work to repel unwanted critters while preventing new ones from moving in. It's a long-term solution for stressful pest problems. The best part is, there's no need to compromise by bringing in unhealthy chemicals; plant-based ingredients can keep household pests away for good! So consider grabbing a bag of Stay Away® Spiders and eliminate your pest problem!