La Cañada Flintridge residents are noticing some new guests in their backyards and gardens as fall arrives — spiders, usually brown, with striped legs, that are stretching their webs all over the place.
Leanne Lowden Mothershead, who has lived in La Cañada for five years, said that this summer the spiders have proliferated to the point of being a nuisance.
“They come every summer, but this summer has been the worst since I’ve lived in La Cañada,” said Mothershead.
UC Riverside arachnologist Rick Vetter, an expert in brown recluse and brown widow spiders, looked at photos of spiders from Mothershead’s home and identified them as members of the common orb weaver family. Vetter described orb weavers as “basically the same spider as [in the book] ‘Charlotte’s Web.’”
Vetter said orb weavers are annuals, and this is the time of year when the current generation of spiders is fully grown.
“This is when people find them,” said Vetter. “They sprout in the spring and grow up and get big; they’re making eggs right about now, and then die off.”