HelpfulGardener.com

Hi,

I have three potted plants in my balcony. I see lot of spider webs on the plants for the past two months. I don't know if it's related, but I feel like there are more dead leaves than before. I remove the cobweb every couple of days, but they appear again. I haven't seen any spider though, whenever I inspect the plants. Any suggestion on how can I get rid of the spiders? Or are spiders/spider webs not harmful for the plants (pepper and basil).

Thanks.

Could be baby spiders. Some species hatch in the summer through fall. Unless they're eating pollinators, which I don't think so, the spiders are probably harmless to your plants. If anything they might eat some of the crawling bugs that eat your plants. Spiders are good to have around. They keep the other bugs honest.

It could also be red spider mites if the webbing is under leaves and leaf crotches.
Can you post pictures?

I was not able to get a good picture of the spider web. Even if I zoom in, it was not clearly visible.

Though, yesterday I saw what I think is the red spider mite you mentioned. It was red and really small, may be 1mm or 2mm.