Pest Management Professional, April 2014

dos donts Dr Stuart Mitchell t Technical Editor AMERICAN HOUSE SPIDER Do the applied araneaeology and dont let the American house spider Parasteatoda tepidariorum offend structural inhabitants Eliminate these coverts through an environmentally benign process of integrated pest management IPM Do know the IPM process can be defined as inspecting and investigating identifying establishing threshold levels implementing two or more control measures cultural physical mechanical and chemical and evaluating effectiveness Dont just inspect isolated architectural areas Conduct a systematic study of the structure and exterior premises to discover and examine all facts Do interview customers to discover comparative and corroborative information Dont guess Identify the spiders species Do determine customers tolerance levels because theyll have varying sensitivities to the presence of spiders Dont initiate any control measures cultural physical mechanical or chemical before an environmental impact assessment determining possible negative effects actions could have on the immediate environment Do focus on cultural or behavioral control Educate and modify appropriately customers about their negative actions and mannerisms in conjunction with their environment that allow these pests to persist Dont just evaluate the initial effectiveness of intervention Ensure sustainable interventions by following up periodically collecting data and making appropriate adjustments PMP Dr Mitchell D O Ph D M P H B C E a board certified physician and entomologist is principal technical specialist for PestWest Environmental as well as PMPs Technical Editor He can be reached at docmitchell@ northcoastmedia net or 515 333 8923 Common house spider with spiderlings most wanted ARANEAEOLOGY Photo courtesy of and copyrighted by Gene White pmimages@ earthlink net A raneaeology is the study of spiders As araneaeologists pest management professionals PMPs investigate offenses of our sensibilities Through their mere presence spiders can offend customers visually and psychologically The commonly encountered American house spider Parasteatoda tepidariorum invades numerous construction types Using silk spun fiber proteins the American house spider which can live longer than a year constructs asymmetrical webs in corners and angular spaces Each female averages about seven oval parchment like brown egg sacks about 250 eggs per sack producing about 3760 eggs in her lifetime The sacks can be found in the webbing Soon after second instar spiderlings balloon and produce independent webs Adult females are shorter than 1 4 in long and males are about 1 6 in long With eight eyes and two proximal pairs the female is yellowish brown on the carapace upper exoskeleton with a dingy white to brown abdomen Her legs are yellowish and pale ringed as opposed to the males legs which are jailhouse orange Pale chevrons are on the back The American house spider produces sticky silk stand webs to capture insect victims The comb clawed spider waits within an extra silky area of the web Larger victims become entangled and more aggressively battered with additional silk and torque Silks serve various functions Ampullate minor temporary scaffolding during construction Ampullate major dragline for the outer rim spokes and lifeline Piriform forms bonds between separate threads attachment points Aggregate glue of sticky globules Flagelliform capturing lines Tubuliform egg cocoon for protecting eggs and Aciniform wraps and secures freshly captured prey and male sperm webs stabilimenta PMP Dr Stuart Mitchell t Technical Editor 74 April 2014 Pest Management Professional www mypmp net