IT’S that time of year when I am afraid of our garden.

I absolutely hate to admit this, being an age when I should have more sense than to be silly about certain things, but I just cannot help it – and yes, I am talking about creepy crawlies. Yuck.

Opening the windows for ventilation purposes in our house, which we all know is essential in autumn and winter, throws open a cosy home to invaders from the outer realms.

So far, I have found earwigs and woodlice in the bathroom, and confronted several silly fluttering harvestmen, AKA daddy longlegs (the husband’s least favourite creature) in the living / dining area.

Given that I can dispose of these with no problem at all, I have been able to cope with the house, but the main culprits – spiders - have turned the garden into practically a no-go zone.

Their increasing size has been well documented in the national media of late because September seems to be a month when their presence looms large for us all.

I do suffer from arachnophobia – and I have written about it before – and no matter how hard I try to maintain a stiff upper lip, one sight of a big hairy eight legged critter is enough to reduce me to a shrieking wreck.

I blame previous spider trauma for this, including an incident where big ‘un scuttled over my pillow just before I was about to lie down for the evening. I am in utter awe of those people who can get rid of spiders by lifting them with their hands and depositing them outside, or are even man/ woman enough to do that trick where you trap them in a glass, slide something under it and dispose of them that way.

Presently, I stand and cower at the back door in the dark, afraid to put the bin bag in the outside bin because I know that, the instant that I leave the back step and move towards the back gate, I’ll feel myself walk through the webs which have been strung all over the garden.

Even if I manoeuvred around like Catherine Zeta-Jones in Entrapment, I doubt I could avoid them – and that’s of course if I could even see these invisible threads.

Earlier in the month, before there was maximum spider action in the garden, I was still managing to take our compostable rubbish out to the bin in the corner.

But, I am afraid the area is now completely off limits, thanks to the multiple cordons which have been erected around the bin by fat-bodied arachnids.

My daughter and I counted them yesterday whilst mowing the lawn and tidying the garden, and there were seven, yes seven, separate large webs around the bin strung from every possible branch and leaf.

Genuinely, I would feel bad wrecking all their hard work just so I could put some potato peelings in our composter.

Whilst simultaneously marvelling at the ability of these creatures to build awesome webs in the middle of nowhere – how do they suspend themselves when commencing construction? – we both accepted our feelings of intimidation and backed away slowly...