Beware the aroused arachnid. As summer heats up hormones, eight-legged Lotharios are looking for love in all of our places.

"More people get bitten during this time of year," says Dr. Frank Lang, retired biology professor at Southern Oregon University.

During warmer temperatures, male spiders are on a mission to find new mates, says Lang. Meanwhile, females are ferociously guarding their nests.

Procreation is making the valley’s two most dangerous spiders — the hobo and the black widow — more than usually willing to tangle with an unwary human, says Lang. When they do, the results are rarely fatal but often serious.

Bites from both male and female hobo spiders can cause serious reactions in humans. But only females are dangerous among black widows.

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Mostly blind and reluctant to leave their webs, Lang says woe betide anyone who disrupts the maternal black widow.

"Black widows seem like they want to bite you," says Lang.

He should know.

Down in the recesses of his garage, in anticipation of a summer game, Lang reached for his tennis racquet and felt something skitter along his inner arm.

Lang didn’t think much of the ticklish sensation at the time. The nausea and vomiting he experienced later that day was due to flu or food poisoning, he surmised. It wasn’t until the next day, when his arm started to swell, that Lang put his symptoms and the ticklish sensation together.

"I remember thinking ‘I wonder if that was a spider,’ " says Lang.

It was too late for antivenin measures by the time Lang determined he’d been bitten by a black widow. He didn’t seek medical attention.

"I had a huge swollen forearm that lasted for three weeks," says Lang.

Lang counts himself fortunate he didn’t have more severe symptoms, which can include increased sweating and salivation, painful abdominal cramping or difficulty breathing.

With a gruesome reputation for killing and eating their mates — a myth, according to several entomology Web sites — black widows are scrupulously avoided by most folks. The native spider is easily identified by its bulbous black abdomen and red hourglass markings on the underside.

But the less easily identified non-native hobo spider can cause trouble, too, as Ralph Campbell of Wimer now knows.

Campbell ended up in an urgent-care clinic after something crawled up his pant leg while he was working in the crawl space under his house, he says.

Doctors told him it probably was a hobo spider.

Eugene Papineau, Jackson County Vector Control manager, has seen plenty of black widows in the valley but never a hobo spider, a fast-moving, brown spider with mottled gray markings. But spiders are all around us — and basements and crawl spaces are two of their favorite locations, he says. And sometimes they do bite.

"People usually get bit when spiders get in their clothing," says Papineau. "Or if the spider gets into their beds and they roll over."

Within a day of Campbell’s foray under his house, a couple small red dots appeared on his right hip. The dots quickly morphed into a section of inflamed tissue the size of a pack of playing cards. Then, within three days, the swollen mass broke open, releasing large amounts of light yellow, clear fluid, he says.

Campbell had flu-like symptoms the whole time. But he did not realize they were related to the bite.

"I stayed home (from work) Monday and Tuesday," says Campbell. "Just didn’t feel well — achy, lethargic. I needed to sleep all day."

On Wednesday, Campbell asked his wife to take him to an urgent-care facility in Grants Pass.

The diagnosis: cellulitis caused by a hobo spider bite. His treatment: wound care, antibiotics and antihistamines.

"I think if it hadn’t opened, I’d have had a good infection going," says Campbell.

Headache, nausea and sweating are typical reactions to hobo spider bites, says Dr. Juan (Mel) Castillo, surgical specialist at Rogue Valley Memorial Center.

All spiders are poisonous. But most don’t have mouths big enough or jaws strong enough to chomp through human skin, says Papineau.

In the event the spider does break through, the bites are typically sterile, Castillo says. But they can create serious problems, particularly for children or people with compromised immune systems. Patients are often treated with "whopping doses of steroids" and painkillers, sometimes morphine, he says. Secondary infections are common.

After systemic symptoms are dealt with, the victim’s biggest problem can be wound management, he says. Blistering and ulcers are common.

"I’ve seen some wounds take months or even years to heal," Castillo says.

Alma Spicer of Shady Cove says her contact with a hobo spider probably occurred when she was "digging stuff up outside and underneath the house."

The unwelcome interaction put her in Providence Medford Medical Center for five days. She felt out of sorts for a month and was left with two holes in her body from the spider bites.

Spicer’s initial reaction to her bites were flu-like symptoms and a severe headache. Later the bites became red, swollen and "looked like a gunshot wound from a 38-caliber bullet."

A few days later, Spicer ended up at Providence on morphine and intravenous fluids — and in the charge of a wound care nurse.

"Each day, twice a day, the wonderful nurse had to flush the two holes to get all the poison out," says Spicer. "That was quite an experience. It was worse than having a baby."

The bite on Spicer’s derriere created an ulcer the "size of a tennis ball" that had to heal from the inside out. The bite on her left thigh was smaller, but has "left a divot," she says.

Castillo says most wounds do eventually heal but leave a scar. Any suspicious bite should be checked out by a physician. The sooner the victim starts to receive proper wound care, the better, he says.

"Once you get to the point where you’re having a profound reaction, other things can be just as dangerous," said Castillo. "If you’re having swelling, redness and nausea, go in."

Often what appears to be a spider bite can be a life-saving warning sign for an illness like diabetes, says Castillo.

"Eighty percent of what people suspect are spider bites are not spider bites at all," said Castillo. "It could be a hypersensitivity to some form of flying insect like a mosquito. Impetigo can also be mistaken for insect bites. The shift really needs to be on proving it."

Unless the person sees the spider bit, captures the culprit and brings it in for positive identification, positive confirmation of bites is impossible, says Rick Hilton, entomologist at the Southern Oregon Research and Extension Center in Central Point.

Hilton agrees that many people — including medical staff — mistakenly believe most painful, small, red wounds are spider bites. When Hilton’s wife poked her finger with wire mesh, doctors were quick to assume the puncture was a bite, he says.

"The first thing they asked was ‘Did you get bit by a spider?,’ " says Hilton.

Hilton suspects the spiders themselves may be getting a bad rap. They help control other insect pests, he says.

Ironically, the hobo appears to be a rather benign arachnid in Europe, he says.

But, there are numerous U.S. reports of hobo spider bites causing serious reactions similar to the those of the brown recluse spider, says Hilton.

Papineau says it’s obvious people are getting painful injuries from spiders. But no one knows exactly how many. Health departments do not require notification of spider bites.

All agree the best deterrent is to avoid direct contact with spiders. Block access to your home by keeping door and window insulation intact. Be especially vigilant in basements and crawl spaces, and around hot tubs, pump houses and sheds. When working outside, avoid turning over rocks and wear gloves and long pants.

"Everywhere you go, you’re probably not more than 10 feet from a spider," says Papineau.

Reach reporter Sanne Specht at 776-4497 or e-mail sspecht@mailtribune.com.