Year of the Spidey

Every year, my friend John says: "This is the year of the [fill in the blank]". He bases this, not on the Chinese calendar, but on the number of dead animals he sees squashed along the roadside.

While his is not a particularly scientific observation, he does tend to be correct regarding which species is vastly overpopulated in a given year.

This year, John declared: "This is the year of the spider". Sure enough, there are about a gazillion spiders in the house and around the house. I have never seen so many different types of spiders. There are days when it is impossible to enter or exit the house or walk through the woods without passing through a web.

I might appreciate this wonder of nature more if I weren't allergic to spider bites, and I've had quite a few this year. Once of out favorite local MD's, was bitten by a spider, ignored the bite, and died a few days later.

You would think that with the increase in the spider population, there would be a corresponding decrease in the insect population, their food source. Maybe that has happened, since another competitor for that food source, the wonderful big warty toads, are notable absent from the garden this year. I really miss those toads.

All in all, this is a long explanation of why my home appears to be so unkempt this year. Of course, the spider webs everywhere are a result of overpopulation, not of my neglecting the dusting.....