7 Creepy Crawly Garden Spider Facts
Updated: Nov. 03, 2022
Hone your backyard spidey sense with spider facts! Learn how to attract them and why they're so beneficial to your garden.
The Most Common Spiders in North America
Looking to learn spider facts, including which spiders are lurking in your garden? The three most common garden spiders in North America are the black and yellow, silver, and banded. While you might think they’re creepy, these garden allies are useful. They provide natural pest control, just like another one of our backyard friends, ladybugs.
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Spiders Have Big Families
It’s a good idea to get used to spiders existing in your garden, because they have pretty big families. An egg sac produced by a female banded garden spider may contain more than 1,000 eggs.
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How Many Spider Species Exist?
One of the more startling spiders to spot, some orb weavers get a bad reputation because of their large size. There are plenty of them, too. More than 175 orb weaver types of spiders exist in North America. That sounds like a lot, but it’s just a fraction of the roughly 40,000 spider species in the world!
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How Large Is a Garden Spider’s Web?
On the subject of orb weavers, garden spiders are part of the orb weaver family. They create circular webs that may reach up to two feet in diameter. These intricate webs are designed to capture and immobilize prey. And “pick on someone your own size” doesn’t apply to the female black and yellow garden spider. She’ll feast on prey up to two times larger than her.
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Spiders Don’t Have Great Eyesight
Despite having eight eyes, these creatures have relatively poor vision. They are better at picking up vibrations. Sometimes they leave their web, attach themselves to it with a single silk strand, and pounce when they feel the vibration of prey caught in the web.
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How to Attract Spiders to Your Garden
If you’ve enjoyed these spider facts and want to attract spiders, there are a few methods you can try. Put out the welcome mat for garden spiders with these four tips:
- Lay mulch to create protection and humidity.
- Provide places for web attachment.
- Leave your garden intact for winter spider habitat.
- Avoid pesticide use.
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Originally Published: August 31, 2022
