Spidey sense.

[Ormonddude]

neither is your sense of taste

My sense of taste is why is this even a issue? the boat interior mildews and needs to be wiped down anyway - first pop off a fogger then wipe it down and your in good shape for the season actually offering a practical solution is not in bad taste anymore than very complex answers to simple problems is. In other words they are Arachne they invaded your boat stop being all hire a coven a witches brew some eye of newt and just friggin get in the 21st century toss in a bug bomb like a good soldier wipe the boat down and get on with it!

[K9Kampers]

Odude-

That smilie meant sarcasm, because we don't have a sarcasm sign!

[Doug W]

You might try hedge balls or hedge apples as a repellent. They have a centuries old reputation as a natural repellent and people around here put them in their basements over the winter. I have never personally brought them inside for that purpose mainly because we don't have a spider problem but I have noticed the ground around our trees where they fall (we literally have bushels of them on the ground) have no bugs scampering around at all unlike other areas of the yard. I have even seen them for sale on Ebay LOL! The StarTribune printed this article on them:
.

With my boat stored in a horse barn, I have osage oranges (local term for hedge apples) scattered about the barn and on Galactica. They seem to be fairly effective part of the year. I'm terrified that a brown recluse spider may take up residence there. Those are one nasty little critter. If you have strong intestinal fortitude, google image brown recluse bites.

My wife strategically placed dryer sheets in the cabin. I do not know if they repel critters, but they smell nice.

[Azzarac]

If nothing else you can let the kids use the hedge apples as craft projects for Halloween and scare the spiders off your boat!


Just a thought... Maybe you really CAN compare Osage Oranges to Hedge Apples!

[Doug W]

Just a thought... Maybe you really CAN compare Osage Oranges to Hedge Apples!

[mastreb]

So I had no idea what you guys were talking about with "Hedge Apples" and "Osage Oranges". I wikipediad it. Apparently it's as effective as DEET in keeping many species of insects at bay. And only mildly poisonous to humans.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maclura_pomifera

[Crikey]

And only mildly poisonous to humans.

Great!
Probably the same goes for the dryer sheets...

[K9Kampers]

[BruceK]

In Maryland, at least our piece of the bay, the numbers are generally tolerable. The spiders we have seem quite well fed, with all those marina insects populating their webs. So, I like the balance, with bugs getting eaten quite regularly. But I could see that above a certain number would be nasty. And I usually do away with the biggest/ nastiest looking ones (ie, once they seem well-fed enough!). No bites on overnight trips, yet! The little ones don't seem to bother any of us except my arachnophobic 17 year old. When she's on board, we try to keep the few remaining pests away, before she notices.

I think frequency of boat use helps. This past year I had a friend pay for the slip, in exchange for 1/2 time use. Of course we exchanged dates regularly, and got a few sails in together. But I think boats like to be used... Worked out great for us, shared maintenance projects, etc. And it kept these sorts of problems to a minimum...

[K9Kampers]

Some snakes eat spiders...

[finding41]

Spiders were a huge problem for us this year. We have a dock and are right off the woods so racoons were a problem too. The people that were on moorings didn't have any of the same problems we did.
I must say there is a great sense of satisfaction when you flick a spider about 10' out into the water and see it running back to the boat only to be eaten by a fish.