Photo: Baby spiders

Charlotte's babies
Photo by Seattle Poppy

I don't know what kind of spiders these are or how big they get. I suspect they will prefer to be outside, munching on all those annoying flying things that cluster around the lights and fly into your house.

One year in particular there were a huge number of babies spiders that hatched. As far as I can tell, the nest was in my neighbor's tall tree. When the babies left the nest, they floated down at an angle on individual strands of silk. They were tiny, tiny brown creatures - so small that I thought I was seeing spots in my eyes! I had to get a magnifying glass to see what they were.

We have a recessed porch light and it attracts an annoying number of bugs. Therefore, I was happy when a spider took up residence by the light. Last year the spider got innovative and built a hanging basket net around the light. It hung down about four inches and covered the entire area of the light. Very few bugs got into the house that year.

DKH