As summer gets into full swing and the warm weather descends, spiders are coming out in their droves across the country.
But while it may be first instinct to call in fumigators, experts have warned against ridding your home of all the eight-legged critters.
Instead they claim just two of the thousands of species in Australia pose a deadly threat, the red-back and the funnel web, and that other insects help keep your garden in check.
As summer gets into full swing and the warm weather descends, spiders are coming out in their droves across the country (Pictured is a common black spider)
‘People may want to eradicate everything in the backyard, but you shouldn’t actually want every insect in your garden dead,’ Macquarie University post-doctoral researcher Lizzie Lowe told the Sydney Morning Herald.
‘You want to have the good guys to help control the bad guys… so you don’t have these massive outbreaks of creatures.’
Ms Lowe added that many people tend to think ‘every spider is out to get them’ but there were actually only a few species that have caused documented deaths.
‘In Australia, we have over 8000 species of spider and only two that will kill you, and they haven’t killed anyone in 40 years,’ she said.
However experts claim just two of the thousands of species in Australia pose a deadly threat, including the funnel web spider (pictured)
Red-back spiders (pictured) are also deadly, with around 2,000 people bitten each year but no deaths for ‘more than 40 years’ experts say
Only red-back and funnel web spiders have caused deaths in Australia, however none have occurred since anti-venom was made available in 1981, according to the Australian Museum.
Around 30 to 40 people are bitten by Sydney funnel web spiders each year, with just 13 deaths recorded.
While around 2,000 people are bitten by red-back’s but annually but just 13 have died, with an anti-venom to the deadly insect introduced in 1956.
Most people who sustain spider bites are not able to identify the spider correctly, with the Museum stating ‘it is nearly impossible to work out what species has caused a bite without seeing a specimen of the spider’.
And despite people opting to try and ‘exterminate’ spiders in their homes, black house spiders and other insects such as cockroaches commonly return following fumigation.
Experts recommended cleaning gutters and changing white outdoor globes to fluorescent lights to avoid attracting potential spider-prey.
Experts recommended cleaning gutters and changing white outdoor globes to fluorescent lights to avoid attracting potential spider-prey (Pictured is a white-tail spider)