The Most Effective Spider Control For Your Dallas Home

Spiders are common visitors in homes that don't have year-round pest control. Those who have a fear of spiders quickly get professional pest control in Dallas. They have zero-tolerance for these eight-legged pests and know that the most effective way to control spiders is to have someone with training and experience address spider control. Those who do not fear spiders sometimes tolerate them because they know spiders help with controlling mosquitoes, flies, roaches, and other potentially dangerous pests. We believe the most effective control for spiders is somewhere in the middle. There are things you are best equipped to do when it comes to spider control, such as replacing your weatherstripping and door sweeps. Leaky doors are an open invitation for spiders. Some things are best done by a licensed professional, such as the application of a crack and crevice treatment on the foundation of your home. Today, we'll look at a few things you can do to address spiders in Dallas and tell you how the professionals at All-Safe Pest & Termite provide layers of protection on top of what you do. If you don't care to know how spider control works, jump to our contact page and we'll send a friendly and knowledgeable technician over to perform an inspection and guide you toward a plan that will get rid of spiders in your home and keep them from entering. If you like learning fun facts about pests and want to know natural ways to keep common spiders in Dallas from creeping you out, read on and enjoy.       

Types Of Spiders Often Found In Dallas 

Let's start by getting into the mind of common spiders. The more you know about their natural behavior patterns, the greater success you'll have controlling them. Keep in mind that these tips are not entirely exclusive to each spider as they often work with all spiders. We're just using each as a prime example of why these methods work.

House Spiders: Any spider that routinely gets into homes is considered a house spider. The most common house spiders are actually called common house spiders. They also go by the name of American house spiders. American house spiders are tiny, yellowish spiders with bulbous abdomens that create wispy webs in the upper corners of your home. Another common house spider is the daddy-longlegs spider (not to be confused with the proper daddy-longlegs, which is actually a harvestman, not a spider). These long-legged critters are creepy but entirely harmless. They prefer undisturbed areas of your home. The primary control for common house spiders is house cleaning. Wiping down surfaces and removing dust will deter these spiders from creating webs because they prefer to establish webs in dusty, undisturbed spaces.   

Wolf Spiders: These are the most common hairy-looking spiders you find in your home. Unlike house spiders, they don't create webs. But they do prefer dusty, undisturbed areas and house cleaning will impact these spiders, to a certain extent. The primary control method for wolf spiders is exclusion work. A can of expanding foam goes a long way toward keeping these hunter spiders from accessing your home through available entry points. 

Black Widow Spiders: These spiders are mostly outdoor spiders. They don't typically stay inside long. So, while sealing entry points will keep widows out of your Dallas home, your primary control method is yard work. Rake up leaves, remove sticks, and get rid of yard clutter. Your goal is to give black widow spiders few places to hide on your property, particularly near your exterior walls.   

Brown Recluse Spiders: These are hybrid spiders. They do well outdoors but can also get into your home and stay indoors permanently. Brown recluse spiders are so good at indoor life that some infestations in the United States have been calculated to have more than 5,000 individual spiders. The secret to controlling recluses, and most other spiders, is to control the food they eat. Spiders eat flying insects, crawling insects, bugs, and tiny animals. A pest-free home is a spider-resistant home.  

Some Spiders Are More Dangerous Than Others 

Black widow spiders and brown recluse spiders are venomous. They are considered the only two medically important spiders in the United States. Therefore, detection and identification are equally as important as effective spider control.

Black Widow Spiders: Widows actually come in two colors. You may see one that is jet black and has a red hourglass marking or you might see a brown widow spider with a red or orangish hourglass marking. Both are equally venomous and share similar behavior patterns. If you happen upon a web that looks tangled, pluck a strand. Widows create webs from strands that are strong. You may hear a plucking noise when breaking one of the strands. These webs are built near the ground, in holes, or in voids. Widow spiders use their webs to catch prey, so you'll find them in areas of bug activity, such as a branch pile.   

Brown Recluse Spiders: These are hunter spiders. While they create webs, their webs are not for catching prey. If you don't see recluse spiders in your home (and you're not likely to see them), you can use web detection to help with detecting these spiders as well. Their webbing is found near the ground and in holes, just like black widow spiders, but you won't hear a plucking sound when breaking a strand.

Keep a wary eye out for low, tangled webs and you'll get the drop on these two pests before they accidentally get the drop on you. Along with web detection and evaluation, you can deter venomous spiders and other spiders by addressing the factors that cause spiders to get inside your home. Let's take a look.  

Factors That Bring Spiders Into Your Home 

The best way to dissect spider management is to take the path a spider will take. We'll begin on the outskirts of your yard, move to the perimeter, and end by looking at indoor attractants. 

The Outskirts: When a spider enters your yard, it can't see your home. What it will see are bugs active in your yard. Addressing pest food, such as the nectar in flowering weeds, will deter pest activity and reduce bugs as a spider attractant. 

Yard Clutter: Before spiders infest your landscaping, they may infest an object in your yard. Remove yard clutter to get rid of potential hiding places and feeding areas. 

Exterior Lighting: Insects are attracted to white light. One of the best ways to reduce insects (and the spiders that eat them) is to keep lights off or replace white lights with yellow lights. Why yellow lights? Because insects can't see the yellow spectrum of light and are not attracted to it.

Landscaping: Healthy landscaping is resistant to plant-damaging pests, such as aphids and white flies. When you resist aphids, you keep them from leaving honeydew on your plants. Less honeydew will result in fewer pests because many pests love to eat this residue. Fewer pests will result in fewer spiders. 

Trash: Flies and other pests love a stinky trash receptacle. Keeping receptacles clean and covered will reduce pests and keep spiders from setting up shop near your exterior trash. 

Walls: Spiders don't make entry points. They get into your home through openings that already exist. You can keep them out by sealing cracks, gaps, and holes, and also by repairing essential building materials such as weatherstripping and door sweeps.

Yard Work: All pests love piles of leaves, sticks, and other organic materials. Remove these to reduce pest activity and to prevent spiders from establishing themselves near your home. 

Spider Webs: Removing spider webs deters spiders from making webs but also has the potential to remove hundreds of eggs hiding inside spider egg sacs. Outdoor spider reduction is key to indoor spider prevention.

Home Sweet Home: A bug-free home is not a place any self-respecting spider wants to live. Keep your home clean and free of organic debris. Address indoor plumbing issues such as leaking faucets and shower heads. Reduce indoor clutter and keep dust to a minimum.

Do you see how it works? Now, let's look at what a professional will do to keep spiders out of your home. 

Professional Pest Control Makes For The Best Spider Control

Some of the tips provided above are things you're best equipped to do. A pest control provider isn't going to repair your home, rake your yard, and remove clutter. Those are things you are best equipped to address. But your service provider can actually do more than you might think. Here are some of the many ways we keep spiders from getting into Dallas homes.

• Seal entry points in your exterior to make it more difficult for spiders to find a pathway indoors. We use high-quality material, such as caulking and expanding foam.
• Remove webs and destroy spider egg sacs.
• Provide granular applications in your yard and landscaping to reduce pest activity. Since spiders eat bugs, this deters spider activity along with those other bugs.
• Provide liquid crack and crevice applications all the way around your home. All pests, including spiders, will have a hard time living near your exterior walls or finding tiny entry points to access when you have routine barrier treatments.
• Perform indoor treatments as needed to repel or capture indoor pests. When spiders get inside and don't find food, they won't want to stay long.

Want to learn more about how residential pest control can help you live pest-free, and particularly, spider-free? Reach out to us today to request a service visit. We look forward to helping you discover pest-free living in Dallas.