The rains have stopped, which is better for the health of the chickens. It would be better that their shavings and droppings are dry rather than damp, for their respiratory health. However, hotter dryer weather means more scorpions in the house looking for water and a/c. I started hearing noises coming from the sink drain and an hour later this thing was climbing up the bathroom wall. I’m pretty sure it crawled up the pvc pipe from the sink drain and into the house. No matter, it’s dead now. Reasons why i always wear shoes in the house except between the months of november and february.
I grew up in the desert and when I was 6 or 7, I learned (painfully) to shake my shoes out before putting them on my feet. I also shake out work gloves before putting them on, but so far, nothing “bad” has come out of the gloves.
I check my bath towel before using it every day. My bed is zipped in a mosquito net tent that i buy from china every couple years. There is only one cabinet in the house, in the kitchen. It does not hold pots and pans. It holds all my shoes. I shake them out before putting them on and i also keep them in this cabinet because there are no holes and no plumbing tubes going into this cabinet and it seems to keep the scorpions out. I wear flip flops in the house, never barefoot. When it gets really hot and dry i lock the dogs in the crate at night rather than let them sleep on the floor because the crate trays are raised and they’re less likely to get stung.
While hiking on a late evening, I watched a tarantula catch and eat a scorpion. Maybe some “working tarantulas” in the house would be worthwhile?
As a kid, I would let tarantulas walk around on my arm and they were quite gentle…but I don’t know if I’d like waking up to a tarantula sitting on the pillow next to me. 🙂
I let the wolf spiders stay in the house for this reason but this one now has just picked a really unfortunate place to put his web. He keeps trying to incorporate my sister’s homemade curtains and the webbing becomes sticky and holds all the dust and bugs so i keep taking it down hoping he’ll pick somewhere else but he really likes that one spot at the curtain. I like the wolf spiders and the orb weavers. My brother in law likes tarantulas. I haven’t seen too many of those out here.