little miss muffet
It’s a good year for the spiders. Actually, it’s a good year for all the insects, I’m fairly certain that ants and snails will be in charge of everything fairly soon. (Perhaps they already are). But there are also fireflies and dragonflies and damselflies and butterflies.
In general, I don’t spray anything in my garden, so I’ve learned to coexist with the pretty bugs and the ugly ones, the chewed up leaves and the ruined buds. I admit to using natural methods to try and control the ant hills in my flower beds, and there have been some attacks on wasps, because well, they’re wasps.
The birds are quite happy with the assortment of delectables, and the insects that eat other insects, well, they are my friends. So, yes, spiders are my friends. Praying Mantis are my friends. Ladybugs are my friends. Toads and frogs, though unrelated, are also my friends. Japanese Beetles, no matter how much they dress themselves up all pretty, are the enemy. Flies drive me insane.
So I will take an ugly old spider any old day. I never kill them, even when I find them inside (which is fairly often). Mostly, I just let them be, unless there is someone particularly squeamish around, and then I take them outside.
There’s something magical about a spider’s web. Something magical about watching one spin down from the ceiling on an almost invisible thread.
Of course, I’m quite certain I wouldn’t feel that way if I were a fly.
And when it happens right over my head as I lay in bed reading, well, okay, I admit, that’s a little creepy.
But yesterday was that kind of day.
(And no, I didn’t kill it.)
July 25th, 2013 at 8:13 am
glad you did not kill it…though at times i can not say the same for my wife….she gets freaked out by them…they are magic…the webs beautiful in the morning sun…we coexist pretty well with nature here…tossing scrap after each meal at the bottom of the yard they let us see into their world a bit as they come and eat…this morning i have hummingbirds hovering to check me out as i sit on the porch reading….wonder if they are as curious of us?
July 25th, 2013 at 9:17 am
we “housed” some really huge spiders in an aquarium in our garage when our son was 10. he found them in the woods across the street from our house. when we realized the female spider had eaten the male spider after spinning a cocoon around him and then “laid” 3 huge egg sacs we were beside ourselves. after research, we found that each sac contained approx. 2000 spiders…each….and then we were done. with spiders of any kind. forever !!!
July 25th, 2013 at 12:42 pm
I have to say Lil’ Miss Muffet is very pretty ,sitting on “YOUR ” plant , she looks very content so I’ll just let her be LOL….
July 25th, 2013 at 10:35 pm
Ha, I always tell my grandchildren that spiders are good, as they kill other insects that are NOT so good (like flies); and I tend to let spiders live as well; but I would draw the line at one over my head in bed. I would worry that it would stay there in the night and eventually fall into my mouth when I was sleeping. Long shot, I know…but…. Nope, THAT spider would have to go.