How Spiders Get Into Homes in New Jersey

Spiders and homes go together. That is why there are several species of spiders that are called common house spiders. But why are they common? How do those spiders get into your home? Aren’t your exterior walls and foundation sealed? Here are some common ways spiders get into our homes. Check to see if one of these might be the way they’re getting into your New Jersey home.

The doors of your home aren’t just a great way for you to enter your home; they’re a great way for spiders to enter your home too. Doors can develop many vulnerabilities over time. Here are a few of them:

• Weather stripping around your entire door is meant to keep the heat in and the bugs out. If it gets damaged, it isn’t going to do a good job at either of these tasks. Do a close inspection and repair any area where you see gaps.
• The door sweep on a door plays a similar role; it keeps heat in and bugs out. Sometimes gaps can form at the corners of a door and allow heat to escape and bugs to get in. If you can see light coming in from the outside, this is where your spiders might be coming in.
• The frame around a door can sometimes become an entry point. When insects and rodents chew holes in door frames, these holes can be used by spiders.
• Around the outside of your door frame is a seal. If this seal is damaged, it can allow pests to get into your door frame voids and go into your wall voids from there.

Windows can be as vulnerable as doors. If screens are damaged or the seals around your windows are damaged, spiders may find a way to get inside your home. This is especially true of windows in foundation walls. Some spiders, especially poisonous spiders, stay low to the ground. If a black widow or brown recluse gets into your home, it is likely to be through a low entry point.

Another low entry point that poisonous spiders and hunter spiders, like the wolf spider, will get in is through is a crack in the mortar between your bricks or a crack in your cement foundation wall. If you see any cracks, there are patch kits to fix these kinds of vulnerabilities.

Spiders can scale your exterior walls and get to high entry points. Spiders that eat flies commonly make webs up near soffits and rooflines. When they are in these locations, they can sometimes find their way in through tiny gaps that are up there. Taking the time to do a roof and soffit inspection could not only help you resist spiders, but it could also get you on track to sealing spots where heat is escaping from your home.

If your home has a chimney stack on the side, this can become an entry for spiders. Over time, a chimney stack can pull away from the exterior wall of a home and a gap can form. It doesn’t take much of a gap for spiders to get in. It also doesn’t take much of a gap for rainwater to get in and damage your home. Be sure to check your chimney closely.

Sometimes spiders don’t come in through entry points. Sometimes spiders are carried in. How might this happen?

• Some spiders lay their eggs in trees. If you get a Christmas tree with eggs on it, it doesn’t take long for the spiders inside those eggs to think it’s springtime. Within a few short days, you’ll have hundreds of spiderlings crawling on your walls.
• Do you heat your home with wood or use wood in a fireplace? When you bring firewood inside you can bring eggs and adult spiders inside too.
• Spiders like to hide in storage boxes. If boxes are moved inside from an outside storage location, this can sometimes bring spiders into a home.
• Spiders can sometimes hide in stored furniture. If you buy a piece of used furniture, you may get some used spiders along with it.

There are many ways spiders get in but only one sure fire way to get them out. Reach out to ChemTec Pest Control. If you have a spider problem, we have the spider answer.