As many of you know, I spent the better half of last summer identifying various plants and bugs that Lindel had taken pictures of. I made a nice little nature guide scrapbook for my mother-in-law for Christmas, putting to use all of the things I had learned. The most fun (although it gave me the skin-crawlies at times) was identifying all the different kinds of bugs. I had correctly named about four different kinds of grasshoppers, crickets, bees, spiders, etc, etc. I went through all of the pictures Lindel and I had taken over the past couple of years and identified everything I could. It was quite an endeavor, but so much fun. I still owe a friend of mine a copy of my own personal nature guide.
So now, whenever I see any bugs (or plants, or lizards!) I will take pictures and go on a search. I could dedicate a whole subdomain just to my geeky collection, and recently I’ve thought of compiling a book, but for now I’m just going to share the spiders.
I advise those with phobias to check back another day.
I’ll begin with a very short background story of this afternoon. So short, indeed, that this is the story. I stepped into my bathroom, and sitting there in the tub was a very large, very ugly spider who was missing one leg. I don’t shriek unless it’s a cockroach, but there was certainly an audible “ughhhhhhh” accompanied with a quick quiver of my entire upper body. Gross.
First thing: Grab the camera. (Click to enlarge)
Second thing: Flush the spider down the down the drain with scalding hot water.
Third thing: Identify! This is the harmless Steatoda Grossa, a cobweb spider. It is often feared (at a glance) as being a widow or a brown recluse, even though it doesn’t have the same characteristics as either. For this reason, it’s also given the umbrella name “false widow.” It’s really just a big, ugly, benign spider.
So that was today’s adventure in the arachnoid landscape.
Previous adventures include the following!
In late summer of 2005, I was visiting my Dad’s house, whose yard doubles as an amazing wildlife refuge. He’s taken pictures of raccoons eating his leftovers, an egret in his stream, two different species of owls, an extra large snake skeleton, and of course, gigantic spiders. On this particular day, there were two spiders in question. One enormous one (pictured on the left, about the size of a tarantula) was living in a huge mass of web on top of Dad’s sliding glass door. The other (right, much smaller) had woven a regular web on the beams of his porch.
These two pictures gave me the creeps, but the one on the right is so incredibly detailed that you can’t help but keep looking at it. Dad took that one.
So, last summer (two years later) I identified these little beasts. Sort of. The one on the right is an Orb Weaver, Neoscona Crucifera. Again, terribly ugly but completely harmless. They eat people . Bugs. Not people. The one on the left is a little harder to identify because of that thick webbing, but I believe we’re looking at a family. Males are always much smaller than female, so it makes sense that the critter I successfully identified is the male, and I can make an educated guess that the larger, more hideous one is the mama spider.
More spiders? Well, of course!
My wonderful mother-in-law works in a plant nursery on the Outer Banks. Just about every time we visit, we get to mull around in the nursery, pick out a few herbs and houseplants to take home, and Lindel has a large portfolio of amazing pictures from that place. Inside those hot, moist greenhouses are myriads of bugs. Spiders thrive. Especially garden spiders, naturally.
This big guy is so common in gardens, but I had never actually seen one until I was around 19 or 20. If I had, I blocked it from my memory because of it’s monstrous size. Anyhow, this one is a Black and Yellow Orb Weaver, Argiope aurantia. It’s more commonly known as a garden spider, or a writing spider because of their unique zig-zag style web. I can only assume they’re colored so brightly to blend in with flowers, but really I don’t know. They come in all sorts of colors. I’ve seen vibrant red, fluorescent green, and an unnatural blue. Quite the flashy divas. They usually eat bugs, but during a little research, I did come across a picture of one attacking a hummingbird that was caught in it’s web, and as a reference for size, the hummingbird wasn’t much bigger.
More? I know I have a couple more, but I’m starting to feel like something’s crawling on my neck. I’ll leave the spiders alone for now.
Finally, and just to clear my head a little, here’s the lizard I caught on our patio the other day:
Called a broadheaded skink, this one’s male. Females and young have bright blue stripes on their tails. Skink!
