Old Style spider repellent?

shandyclover

It appears DD is severely allergic to spiders. At first we thought our house must be infested with poisonous spiders but now it appears ANY spider bites her and she get a very bad reaction - bite turning into a burn like blister, then a slow healing open sore that scars when it eventually heals. She's been bitten 10 times or so in the last 6 mos, despite us turning the house upside down and vacuuming everything within sight.

We are at our wits end and already decided to move - in the meantime does anyone know of any tried and proven spider repellents?

mummyjane

Lavender is a natural spider repellent which might well be worth trying. You could either hang dried lavender around the home (looks pretty too) or dab the essential oil around. If your dd's skin can take it (lavender is very gentle) mix a few drops of lavender with a moisturiser and rub it all over her before bed etc. I have heard that spiders hate the smell of lemon but have yet to try that one!

hth

Alison_Funnell

I use lavender oil and lemons all the time. We sadly have always had a spider problem, and this is not even an old house. Our previous house was old and we had real problems with them there.

hermum

This may be worth a try, http://www.squidoo.com/Safe-Natural-Spider-Repellent
You can also get plug in repellers, if you google natural spider repellent loads of ideas come up.
I haven't read them all though.
I think that conkers are supposed to repel them but of course it's the wrong time of the year.

Essex-girl_2

Gawd we have loads of spiders here but never been bitten - or perhaps we have but because no reaction then we are not aware!

I absolutely hate spiders, we have the plug in thingy"s & they seemed to have cut down the amount of spiders but we still see some.

The best thing I know of though it isn't OS is the house flea killer you can get from vets. They don't advertise it as this but it also kills spiders. Its a spray and when I have used it before the next day I found a lot of dead spiders about. Others in my family have the same thing.

Just don't do what I did once, I sprayed one room & the spray stopped working. Within a hour there was a family of spiders trouping from that room to the others I hadn't sprayed :rotfl:

tanith

I have a friend in the USA who is terrified of any creepy crawlies and she pays to have the house sprayed inside and out :eek:twice a year... she says they NEVER get any insects inside.. very extreme but it works I understand they leave doors and windows open for a few hours after the treaments..

GreyQueen

I's second the advice about lemon oil; saw this tip in an Aussie housecleaning book, and they have seriously dangerous spiders over there. You're supposed to put the pure oil on a cloth and wipe door and window frames with it.

Slightly off-side, but as you have such a serious spider problem, can I ask if you have ivy or some other creeper on the outside of the house or shrubs touching the walls? I used to live in the sub-basement of a mid-Victorian house with ivy growing up the back and the place was infested with the most enormous spiders. One year we cut the ivy off at the root and let it die on the building, and that cut down the amount of spiders indoors by about 80%. The following year we dragged the now-dead ivy off the building and carted it away and it was very rare to ever see a spider indoors.

Also, spiders spin webs where there is airflow from outside (they use the moving air to bring their prey to the webs) so anywhere draughty is a good place to play hunt-the-spider.

I'm a recovering arachnophobe and have a peacful co-existance with the few spindly spiders which live in my flat but anything bigger gets caught in a glass and tossed outside. Mercifully, I'm not allergic, as far as I know, as I don't recall ever having been bitten. HTH.

Biggles

Actual spider bites are exceedingly rare (only 10s or 100s at most in the country per year), could it be anything else? Or have you seen it happen yourself?
http://www.nhm.ac.uk/nature-online/life/insects-spiders/identification-guides-and-keys/spider-bites/index.html

caledonian_princess

I live in a very old, draughty house and used to be plagued with spiders, usually in the autumn. I try to collect them with a glass/paper and show them the door but I must admit that I have occasionally hoovered up the ones in the high corners of rooms that I can't reach. I found that lavender oil worked and smelled nice too. I do still get the occasional unwanted guest spider, I just try to get rid of them as soon as I see them rather than waiting for them to phone their freinds with news of this fab new squat they've found.

valentina

Not tried it myself, but apparently conkers are a spider repellant!

Aarons_mummy

Eeeek! I hate spiders.

I had a problem last year in my last house with 5 massive things in 2 days. I turned the house upside down to make sure they weren't hiding anywhere. I scoured the internet to find a repellant and the only thing I had in the house was lemon juice so in an old spray bottle I put a good glug of lemon juice, a little disinfectant (lavander scented) and then sprayed it around all the places I thought they might come in any holes/cracks in walls, round the doors, over the windowsills and then generally over the carpet.

Didn't see one in months.

I've only had a couple of teeny ones in here so far but I'll spray round and wash the floors with some lemon juice mixed in nearer the summer.