I just moved to Snohomish county (one or two down from Skagit) in September. I live in a 2nd floor apartment and have only see one or two small spiders inside, but I have seen quite a few larger spiders outside while walking my dog.I don t know if the ones I ve seen outside are poisonous or not; they re definitely not black widows. But they are big...about the size of a nickle when closed/resting on their huge, intricate webs. I ve learned to stick to the sidewalks and not wander onto the grass and into the bushes with my dog, because the webs are very hard to see and I ve almost walked into them multiple times.I moved up from California, and my first guess was that the number of spiders would be a lot lower here because of the rain. But I m still not sure if the rain reduces the number of spiders period, or it if just makes more of them come inside. Like I said, so far I haven t seen many inside the apartment...definitely none of the larger ones...but it may just be because we re on a higher floor (they may be more popular in homes and ground floor apartments).I used to have a bit of arachnophobia too, and it s hard to fix. It s easier to handle in a place like ours, where all the walls are white and the carpeting is light colored (makes it easier to see them) and limited furniture spread well apart (gives them less places to hide). But you re going to someone else s house, and you can t just start moving furniture around to suit your needs. Just give the walls (specifically the corners, where they like to build their webs), the bed and the pillows a quick glance before you hop into bed...that should relax you enough every night to let you get to sleep.
Yes, there are lots of spiders here. Most of them are quite small, and all but one of them is harmless.The only one to worry about here is the brown recluse spider. They like living in dark, musty places like in a wood pile or in a dark corner of an attic or shed. All of the other spiders here can t harm you, and it s most likely that you won t run into our only poisonous spider at all when you come to visit.