Latrodectus hesperus
(Western Black Widow)

Orbweavers are actually easier to find than Black Widows in most of the World. 🙂 I find them by using a dim LED flashlight after dusk. The orb webs are easy to find. in the flashlight glow. It works in shaded places during the day for some species too. They tend to be in places where you know bigger wildlife species are. Deer, skunks, rabbits, snakes and other animals that hide in brushy dense areas during the day, in my experience, are where the orbweavers are.

There are plenty of Orbweaver species in California, they should be easier to find there than New Hampshire. If you click on California in red type in your location or in the menu at the upper right, you’ll see the species that have been submitted to our site. You have spiders on genera Eriophora, Araneus, Trichonephila, Argiope, and more. The latter two are really big spiders. The females live roughly Autumn to Autumn, the males don’t usually live as long. They are easiest to find in late summer/early autumn. The females can be kept as pets in the wild. They… Read more »

Welcome Friend! A lot of us find that it is hard to find people in the physical world who understand our obsessions. There is a good side to that, I can escape people I don’t want to talk to by whipping out my phone to show my spider photos. Nobody follows me into briar thickets full of spiders and snakes, except kids and other nerdy women. I haven’t had a pet spider indoors yet, but a neighbor just gave me a fish tank. I have a bunch of birdhouses outside that spiders live in when birds don’t. I found a… Read more »