It looks like it's "that time of year". I went to the boat after not visiting for a week.

How friggin disgusting! GIANT spiders all over. Webs in and on everything. I squished a couple before remembering that the green goo they leave behind stains the gel coat.

I had a full container of "Spider Off" that is currently empty.

One of the boats moored nearby looks a lot like the Haunted Mansion at Disney. I'd be afraid to go aboard until after an exterminator cleaned house.

Until I took up sailing, I didn't realize such giant spiders grew in Wisconsin.

I'll be down at my boat all day tomorrow de-spidering and cleaning up the mess they have made of my decks. I think the mosquito explosion has given the spiders the opportunity to grow extra huge. I've got some monsters aboard as well. I was simply in awe of how many huge spiders found shelter in my sail cover.

Yeah, I've been fighting the spiders for several years on our boat. They get everywhere. What is odd though is that many years ago there were hardly any spiders on boats in the marinas. We use to have quite a problem with bird poop and would hang lines of plastic flags all over the boats. We called it "goose gear" although the main culprits were sea gulls and particularly the arctic terns.

For awhile I thought the cause of the spider population boom was bugs being blown over the mooring area from the land fill. But if south shore is getting the same problem then I'm not so sure as that area has not had any major changes like McKinley has over the last 30 years.

It's very disheartening to have cleaned your boat of all the mess only to see it worse than ever the next week. I have made a few changes to eliminate some handy hiding places like moving my mainsheet from hanging over a bulkhead when I leave the boat.