We’ve had a little friend staying with us, hanging out in the shower stall. You may recognize it — they love bathrooms, and maybe you’ve got one or a few living with you, too!
Pholcus phalangioides, the long-bodied cellar spider
In fact, I’m going to promise that you’ve got some living with you. Also check your basements and attics. Can’t miss ’em!
(Bonus: look how clean that grout is.)
I rescued three of those from being drowned/cooked when I was taking a shower this morning, for some reason they kept crawling towards the hot water.
I’ve been preoccupied with moving from a house we rented to an apartment. I’ve been moving the spiders outside as I encounter them. We tend to let them stay inside and eat everything else.
A Kukulcania arizonica in the garage. A black velvety spider.
A wolf spider in the living room that managed to avoid the cats.
A couple of brown recluses.
Those long-legged ones are the most common type in my house, too. There are tons of cobwebs from them in my basement that I’ve never cleaned up.
I move mine out of the second bathroom only when I know we’re having visitors over. They’ve colonized every corner and nook of my garage, but I don’t mind. Where I live the mosquitoes are fierce from April to October and these guys will snare many of them before they get into the house.
I haven’t seen any in our shower, but they are all over the rest of our house. I just leave the cobwebs alone and visitors be damned. Actually, right now we get no visitors, so we and our spiders have the house to ourselves. I keep hoping the wolf spiders will take care of the silver fish, but I still see a few of them around. Maybe the wolf spiders are ranching them and selling the meat to other spiders.
I gently transfer spiders from my bathroom to my houseplants. I haven’t had any bugs or diseases on my plants for at least a decade. (Do herbivorous bugs spread diseases?)
The small body and long splindly legs makes for very good concealment in their natural habitat, though the bare walls of our homes are far more revealing. As such, I have never once found one outside.
“Phalangioides” huh? I think you should call him “Phil the Finger”. Pronounced “Phil da fingah” of course.
I know precisely where they are and I usually get it nice and steamy for them so they have a bit of water with whatever seemingly scarce meals they find.