Spare a thought for the humble house spider, even if you’re an arachnophobe and terrified of the small ones, let alone the large, long-legged ones (a house spider can grow to a span of 10cm).

This is the time of year when you’re most likely to see them because they are at their most active, as they reach sexual maturity and males seek out sedentary females.

Overcoming your fear of spiders may be easier said than done, but there are lots of reasons why you should simply allow them to disappear back into the nooks and crannies where they came from.

Spraying them with furniture polish or sucking them into a vacuum cleaner is very definitely not the right thing to do, but did you know that using the ’beer glass and card’ technique and putting a house spider outside may also kill it? Releasing a house spider into the cold is almost certainly a death sentence.

They need to stay indoors, and if you leave them alone you’ll find that they perform an effective pest control service for you.

House spiders kill and consume insects, including:

lClothes moths and their lava (that may be about to ruin your most expensive coat or curtains)

lHouseflies (that carry 41 human diseases which they will readily transmit to our food and to our kitchen worktops)

lFleas (that will make your life a misery if they live in your carpets, and keep re-infesting your pets).

But house spiders are completely harmless to humans. They are not bloodsuckers and they are not interested in biting anything that is too large for them to eat, unless they perceive that their own life is at risk.

The Eratigena and Tegenaria species, to give the house spider its correct names, can live for three years.

They have venomous fangs with which to kill their prey, but even the largest spiders do not have jaws strong enough to pierce human skin. At the very worst they may nip a human finger.

So, if you see a house spider and your first reaction is ’get rid of it’, take a deep breath and think again. Sometimes they actually need our help - if they fall into a bath tub or a kitchen sink, they can’t scale up the smooth sides, and so create a make-shift ladder out of some toilet paper or a tea towel.

Many people think that spiders climb up drains and put a plug into their bath or sink, but it is much more likely that the spider had dropped down from above, in pursuit of water.

Snakes are another species that many people fear (ophidiophobia) and, as with house spiders, this is usually unfounded.

We have Jake the non-venomous corn snake in our small animals unit at the moment.

He’s looking for an experienced owner who understands how to care for a snake correctly, and who has a suitably large vivarium for Jake to live in, on his own.

Jake is well handled, he regularly sheds his skin without any problems, he has a healthy appetite (a mouse a week seems to keep him happy!), and he’s in good health - but he’s a long-term commitment and is likely to live for another ten to fifteen years.

So, whether it’s snakes or spiders, our phobias are usually irrational and we have no reason to fear these amazing creatures.