Should you throw house spiders outside in UK? Do they survive, how long do they live - when is spider season

As we welcome in a new autumn season, we also inadvertently welcome new visitors into our homes - spiders. Many of us don’t like spiders in our homes - and some people are scared of the eight-legged creatures and suffer from arachnophobia.

It is estimated between 3% and 15% of the UK population suffer from a phobia of spiders. If you don’t like spiders, we’ve put together a list of seven ways to keep spiders out of your home.

But, if they’re already in your home is it okay to put them outside? Here’s what you need to know.

When is spider season in the UK?

Spiders usually start to come out in early September, with their presence noticeable in homes until around mid-October. After this, they tend to be spotted indoors less often.

Female spiders are known to stay in one place for all of their lives, but males are always on the move. So, the ones that make themselves comfortable in the same place day after day are likely to be female, but the ones that run away when you are trying to catch them to put them outside are likely to be male.

This is because spiders generally hibernate in winter and spin a warm web in a dark, sheltered place during this season.

They also tend to lay their eggs in the autumn so that the eggs can be protected throughout winter, ready to hatch in spring.

How long do spiders live for?

The average house spider lifespan can be anything from one to two years - that is quite a long time for a spider to be in your home.

“House spiders colonise new houses by egg sacs carried on furniture, building materials and so forth. They usually spend their entire life cycle in, on or under their native building,” wrote Rob Crawford, the curator of arachnids at Seattle’s Burke Museum in the US, in a blog for the museum.

Is it okay to put common house spiders outside?

Most of the time when people see a spider in their home, they catch it and put it outside. This is because we all have the belief that spiders have come from the outside and so trapping them and putting them outside is releasing them back into their natural habitat.

Putting a house spider outside, however, could kill it as some house spiders aren’t able to survive outside in colder temperatures. Generally about only about five percent of the spiders you see indoors have been outdoors, according to Seattle’s Burke Museum.

It does, however, depend on the species of house spider and where it has come from.

Rob Crawford said: “If the spider is a native to the area, it will likely be able to survive outside. But if the spider is a transplant that’s become a house spider — even if its ancestors made the voyage to the ‘new’ place decades to hundreds of years ago — odds are, the spider will perish outside.”

Rick Vetter, a retired research associate of entomology at the University of California, Riverside, however, acknowledged that before houses were built spiders lived outside. He said: "I would say, toss them outside. That’s where they came from. They might die, but then again, they might find suitable habitat."