Garden Residents

It's that time of the year when the garden is winding down and I start the tiresome task of cleaning it up. So, Saturday I was out there trimming and cutting and ripping out...when I spotted the mother of all spiders. It's called a black and yellow garden spider. Supposedly harmless but 100% scary. This is the female; she's probably +3" inches (her body alone is about 1.5"). Harmless I keep telling myself. She doesn't sleep from what I read. She'll eat the male if she's in a cranky mood. And she'll die after she lays eggs, which I understand are thousands. When I spot those egg sacks, which I understand are close to an inch in size...well, I think you can guess what will happen to them...