Last weekend I saw my first praying mantis this year. He was actually quite "alien" like. As I was admiring the size of it, the darn thing very creepily pivoted his head and looked at me. Mind you only the head turned. I tell you it was right out of a Sci-fi movie.
We also have a very large spider web in which our resident garden spider lives and protects. She has been very successful in catching other unsuspecting insects and her ?abdomen has grown larger and more yellow. A smaller spider hangs out close by and we wonder if it is her mate. If so, he has made it a least a week and she hasn't killed him yet.
I should have taken a picture of the cow killer which had the audacity to sting me while barefoot last week. He packed quite a punch and my foot ached for hours. It has now made me afraid to strike out without shoes. Or should I say strike out without watching where I step.
Nice spider! It's a Golden Silk Orbweaver, also known as Nephila clavipes. The black areas on the 1st, 2nd, and 4th leg pairs are actually hair tufts The little spider above I would say with some certainty is the male, and he probably mated with her fairly recently, explaining the expanding abdomen (which is probably full of fertilized eggs) - she'll likely make an egg sac any day now. The guide says that several males may occupy the same web as the female, in addition to different spider species, known as kleptoparasites, which feed on food particles left behind by the larger spider.
ReplyDelete