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Comment by mudil | Hacker News Reader

I catch all spiders at home with a wine glass and piece of paper and throw them out. I do the same with all the flies. No need to kill. Also, I am grossed out to see people smashing insects at home.

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Do people not have Black Widows where they live? 90% of the spiders that I encounter in and around my home (mostly in my garage and my garden) are Black Widows and I thoughtlessly and indiscriminately kill them on sight. When I didn't kill them, they seemed to try to take ownership of different areas of the garden or garage. This happened where I lived in LA, in Goleta, CA, in north Santa Barbara county, and in Orange County. The only place I didn't experience this issue was when I spent a brief period in Riverside County. No spiders in that place, I always assumed it was because it was summer and > 100F highs every day. As if spiders give a shit about a heat wave, but it seemed to have some truth to it.

My thinking is: I don't want to risk my own or my wife or a guests personal health, and so I "deal" with them. Am I wrong?

Guess I'm lucky then... I've lived in LA for about 28 years and I don't think I've ever seen a black widow. Actually I remember when I was ~3, I was sitting (legs crossed) on the patio, my neighbor came over and smashed a scorpion near me with a hammer. Remember it vividly, mostly because I didn't understand why he killed it (at the time). As an adult, I don't recall seeing scorpions, brown recluses, or black widows..

I used to live in Michigan, and much of my extended family still lives there. We're used to black widows, and don't kill them (even though one of my cousins got bitten by a brown recluse and came out pretty badly, you're really in no danger so long as you exercise a few ounces of prudence).

> Do people not have Black Widows where they live?

Nope. I think the most dangerous animal you'd encounter around here is the tick, which is related to the Lyme disease it might carry.

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