Having spent time in various countries and seeing what kind of spiders etc..... there are that like to make themselves known here and there in your home, it got me thinking what kind of bugs are there in Canada? I've had trouble in the past with cockroaches and mozzies and ants so was wondering if all or parts of canada have anything worth noting. I've been in the cold seasons so never noticed anything and of course when you havnt lived somewhere its hard to know what is lurking. Anyone care to share if there are any creepy crawlies out there?

Mozzies in the summer months. We get through gallons of bug spray!

All three of the ones listed have been an issue for us, and not just the bugs -there is the racoon in your garbage, the skunk in the driveway (just waiting for the dog), the chipmunk in the dryer vent and the squirrel down the chimney. Compared to those critters - I don't worry overmuch about the bugs.

Mozzies and black flies. Better with the skeetervac, but still a pain as the suns going down.


Got these stupid black and red beetles all over everything at the moment too, altough they dont seem to do anything.

Blackflies, but only from May til June when they seem to disappear.

The unusually damp spring and early summer meant skeeters were a nuisance this year. More concerning though was the frequency of finding black widow spiders - had to remember to exercise caution fereting around for things in the workshop and barn.

If you have a snake phobia, you might find this part of BC a little challenging. Most are harmless and only grow a couple of feet long like the gopher snake, but rattlers make you stop and think.

Are black widow spiders indigenous to Canada? One of the reasons we never considered Oz was because of the BIG and sometimes poisinous spiders, oh and the heat of course. I don't do heat, makes me all flustered and grumpy

The very southern bit of Canada is just about warm enough for them. They are more common in the hotter, more arid, areas like the Thompson Okanagan district where RICH lives. They are also found on the west coast but are rare in this climate. Comb foot spiders are quite common, and although most of then are quite harmless I tend to apply squashing treatment on sight and it is quite hard to tell if the squished remains on the bottom of your shoe really was a rare black widow or just another poor spider going innocently about its business.

There is also another little nasty on the west coast called a Hobo spider. Their bites can cause necrotic arachnidism, like a mild version of a brown recluse bite (we are far too far north for brown recluses).

Don't worry too much. I hate spiders but apart from taking simple precautions, like wearing gloves and long sleeves if you moving a wood pile or clearing out the garden shed, they are not an issue in day to day life.

Edit: I see you are heading to Nova Scotia. I am pretty sure the climate there will not support a population of black widows.

They are to this part of Canada. Oh, and 40 degrees isn't uncommon here in the summer. No humidity to speak of though.

Then you'll be fine as long as you don't eat them.

It's the venomous ones you want to watch out for.

Horseflies, they come at you aggressively, won't leave you alone, and when they do bite you, it bloody hurts and gives you a really nasty cut because they use those slicer things to slice up your skin.

Please excuse my naivety but how do you deal with black windows? Leave them alone, squash them, spray bug spray on them to kill them or do you need to get an exterminator in so they don't breed?? Especially if in your house, not massively afraid of spiders and will quite happily catch them in a glass and through them outside, but I have never come across any that could potentially kill you!!

Also if you saw a rattle snake near your house, again do you leave it be or get someone in to remove it, especially if close to your house?

What about the dog, I am guessing if they were to eat or get bitten by a black window it would not end well for them?

Spiders get squished, snakes get left alone, the dogs seem to ignore them too. The grass is too short near the house for snakes, but they're common in the roadside verge and the other side of the creek at the bottom of my property where the crown land starts.

Maybe it's just fortuitous, but where the snakes like to bask in the sun on the hillside opposite (rocky, steep terrain), there are lots of cacti, and the dogs have learned through painful experience it's not a fun place to explore. If the dogs got bitten it'd be a dash to the vets.

Oh, and black windows get washed

Doh!! wrong spelling there

I prefer squashing, but I guess that 99% of the time leaving them alone is just as good a policy.

The best defense against nasty spiders is a healthy population of nice ones. They compete for the same food sources and house spiders are apparently very protective of their territory and will attack and kill invading nasties.

The problem with insecticides is that they kill the good spiders as well as the bad ones and can leave your house defenseless.