Spiders on Long Island: What's in Your House, and Which (If Any) to Worry About

Almost every spider you'll find in a Long Island home is harmless to people. The ones we run into most in Nassau and Suffolk homes are cellar spiders ("daddy long legs"), jumping spiders, and American house spiders, and cellar and house spiders live indoors all year. In the fall, the ones you'll see roaming floors, basements, and foundations are mostly wolf spiders, grass spiders, and yellow sac spiders. None of them is dangerous. The brown recluse is not established anywhere in New York. The one spider here with a medically significant bite is the northern black widow, which is uncommon enough that in all his years treating Long Island homes, owner Victor Bonavita has never come across one. If you're seeing more spiders than usual, especially in the fall, it usually means there are more insects around your house for them to eat.

The spiders you're most likely to find

• Cellar spider. What it looks like: Small, pale body, very long thin legs. Where you'll see it: Basement ceilings and corners. Web or hunter?: Loose, messy web. Worth worrying about?: No
• American house spider. What it looks like: Small, brownish, round belly. Where you'll see it: Corners, garages, window frames. Web or hunter?: Tangled cobweb. Worth worrying about?: No
• Wolf spider. What it looks like: Large, hairy, brown or gray, striped. Where you'll see it: Basements, garages, along floors. Web or hunter?: Hunter, no web. Worth worrying about?: No. Can bite if handled; feels like a bee sting.
• Grass spider. What it looks like: Brown with stripes; looks like a wolf spider. Where you'll see it: Funnel webs in lawns and shrubs. Web or hunter?: Sheet web with a funnel. Worth worrying about?: No
• Jumping spider. What it looks like: Small, stocky, big front eyes. Where you'll see it: Windowsills, sunny walls. Web or hunter?: Hunter, no web. Worth worrying about?: No
• Orb weaver (incl. the black-and-yellow garden spider). What it looks like: Round body, often bold colors. Where you'll see it: Gardens, porches, eaves. Web or hunter?: Big wheel-shaped web. Worth worrying about?: No
• Yellow sac spider. What it looks like: Small, pale yellow to beige. Where you'll see it: Ceilings and wall corners at night. Web or hunter?: Hunter; hides in a small silk sac. Worth worrying about?: Mild. A bite can leave a red, itchy sore.
• Northern black widow. What it looks like: Shiny black, red marking underneath. Where you'll see it: Woodpiles, sheds, stone walls, outdoors. Web or hunter?: Messy web close to the ground. Worth worrying about?: Yes. Rare and not aggressive, but the bite needs medical attention.

The three we find most often in Nassau and Suffolk homes are cellar spiders, jumping spiders, and American house spiders. Wolf spiders are the ones that get noticed, because they're big and they run.

Cellar spiders (Pholcidae)

These are the delicate, long-legged spiders hanging upside down in the corners of your basement. Many people call them "daddy long legs," although that name also gets used for harvestmen, which aren't spiders at all. Cellar spiders are harmless to people and eat other spiders, including the ones you'd rather not have. If you shake their web, they'll vibrate so fast they blur. They stay active indoors all year, which is why you'll see them long after the fall spiders are gone.

American house spiders (Theridiidae)

These build the classic tangled cobweb in corners, closets, garages, and around window frames. They're small, brownish, and very common. They rarely bite and are harmless.

Wolf spiders (Lycosidae)

Wolf spiders are the ones that make people jump. They're large (roughly half an inch to over an inch long), hairy, brown or gray with darker stripes, and quick, and they hunt on the ground instead of building webs. They turn up in Long Island basements and garages in late summer and fall, and most of the ones running across your floor then are males looking for mates. They can bite if you pick one up or press on it, but the bite is usually no worse than a bee sting. A female often carries her egg sac, or dozens of tiny spiderlings, on her back.

Grass spiders (Agelenopsis, a funnel weaver)

Grass spiders are often mistaken for wolf spiders. The easy tell is the web: grass spiders build a flat sheet web with a funnel at one end, in lawns, shrubs, and along the foundation. You'll see the webs covered in dew on September mornings. As the weather cools, they drift closer to the house, and some wander inside.

Jumping spiders (Salticidae) and orb weavers (Araneidae)

Jumping spiders are the small, fuzzy spiders on your windowsill that seem to watch you. They're harmless. Orb weavers build the big wheel-shaped webs across porches, eaves, and shrubs. That includes the black-and-yellow garden spider, which startles plenty of gardeners and is harmless too. Orb weavers are most visible in late summer and early fall, and most die off with the first hard frost.

Are there any dangerous spiders on Long Island?

Is there a brown recluse on Long Island?

No. The brown recluse is not established on Long Island or anywhere in New York State. It lives mainly in the south-central U.S. An occasional one can hitchhike in a moving box, but that's rare, and no populations live here. The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation notes that bites blamed on brown recluses in New York almost certainly come from yellow sac spiders.

The spiders most often mistaken for a brown recluse here are wolf spiders, grass spiders, and other brown spiders of similar size. In our experience, calls about a brown recluse inside a Long Island home are rare.

Black widows

The northern black widow does live on Long Island, but it's uncommon and you're unlikely to meet one inside the house. It prefers dark, undisturbed outdoor spots such as woodpiles, sheds, stone walls, crawl spaces, and under decks. It's shiny black, often with red spots on the back and a red marking on the underside that may be a full hourglass or two separate marks. To put "uncommon" in perspective: in all his years of pest control on Long Island, Victor has never come across one.

Black widows are shy and bite mostly when pressed against skin, like when you reach into a woodpile or put on a glove that's been sitting in the shed. Their venom is medically significant, so if you think you've been bitten by one, get medical care. Wearing gloves when moving firewood or stored items is the simplest precaution.

Yellow sac spiders (Cheiracanthium)

Yellow sac spiders are small, pale yellow to cream-colored spiders that hunt at night without a web and rest in small silk sacs where the wall meets the ceiling. They often slip indoors in the fall, and they account for most minor spider bites people get indoors. Their bite can be painful and sometimes leaves a red, itchy sore that takes a while to heal. It's usually minor, but if a bite looks infected or gets worse instead of better, have a doctor look at it.

Why you see more spiders in the fall

Three things happen at once every September and October on Long Island:

• Mating season. Many male spiders reach maturity by late summer and start roaming houses, garages, and sheds looking for females. That's what causes the sudden jump in sightings, and it's why the big spider on your floor is usually a wandering male, not a sign of a nest.
• They follow the food. The insects spiders eat (crickets, flies, and fall invaders like stink bugs and boxelder bugs) push toward your house as the nights cool. Spiders go where their prey is.
• Cooler weather moves them toward the foundation. Outdoor hunters like wolf spiders and grass spiders drift toward the house as temperatures drop, and some find their way in.

That's also why a sudden rise in spiders is worth paying attention to: it often means there's more insect activity around your foundation than you realized.

And if the thing jumping at you in the basement has long, bent legs and a humped back, it isn't a spider at all. It's a camel cricket, another very common Long Island basement pest.

What to do about spiders inside

• Vacuum webs and egg sacs. This is the fastest way to clear a basement or garage. Vacuuming an egg sac takes care of dozens of future spiders at once.
• Relocate or vacuum the wanderers. A cup and a piece of paper works for a single wolf spider. There's no need to squish anything.
• Cut down clutter in storage areas. Cardboard boxes on the floor give spiders and the insects they eat plenty of hiding places. Plastic bins with tight lids help.
• Wear gloves in the shed and woodpile. That's the main way people come into contact with black widows.
• Turn off or change exterior lights near doors. Bright lights draw flying insects at night, which draws spiders to your entryways.

University extension services also recommend sealing gaps around doors, windows, and utility lines, and keeping door sweeps and screens in good repair. That's homeowner or contractor maintenance rather than part of a pest treatment, but fewer openings means fewer spiders, and fewer insects, getting inside.

What your spider count tells you

A few spiders in the basement is normal, and most of them are doing you a favor by eating other insects. It's worth having the outside of your home treated if:

• You're finding wolf spiders inside regularly, not just once or twice a season.
• Webs keep coming back on your eaves, windows, and porch within days of clearing them.
• You're seeing other insects at the same time: crickets in the basement, stink bugs or boxelder bugs at the windows.
• Someone in the house is uncomfortable living with them, which is a perfectly good reason on its own.

Spraying individual spiders doesn't solve much, because more follow the food. That's why our spider treatment is really an insect treatment. We focus on eliminating the food source around your foundation, applying a residual treatment around the perimeter: under the eaves, along the foundation, around window frames, and into the cracks and crevices where insects hide. Prevention goes after the insect populations that draw spiders in, not the spiders themselves. It's the same exterior treatment we use for fall invaders.

Treating inside usually isn't necessary unless the problem is severe. For most homes, vacuuming the webs and checking behind furniture takes care of the spiders already in, and it's what we recommend to every customer.

Other fall invaders on Long Island

Spiders tend to show up alongside the insects they eat. If you're seeing these too, the same exterior treatment covers them:

• Brown marmorated stink bugs
• Boxelder bugs

Stop the cycle at the foundation

If spiders keep showing up no matter how often you clear the webs, the fix is usually outside. Battle A Bug has been treating occasional invaders across Nassau County and Western Suffolk since 1996. Owner Victor Bonavita is a past president of both the New York Pest Management Association and the Long Island Pest Control Association, and our team goes after what spiders are feeding on, treating the foundation, eaves, window frames, and cracks and crevices where those insects live and get in.

Call Nassau: 516-798-2847 | Suffolk: 631-425-2847