Creepy Nature

There was a lot going on between my upstairs window and screen on July 13^th. While mama spider sipped from a bee packaged like a gold and black box juice, her ivory spiderlings emerged from their translucent egg sac to stretch their many legs in the sunlight. It’s not the best photo, due to the Scotch plaid effect of the intervening screen, but you get the idea. What you can't see are the two additional sacs in the web above, outside the photo’s frame. (Actually, in another photo the screen’s wavy grid pattern is the best part, but this shot better portrays nature at work. Merely click on the image to enlarge it.) Another thing you can’t see is my looming face, squinting in fascination.

Today, eleven days later, the mother spider rests upside-down, waiting, her brindled abdomen aimed right at me. I can even see her spinnerets. (Pardon me.) No bee, no spiderlings. Directly above her, only one shadowy egg sac remains, promising as a piñata.

The photo was taken 7/13/08. Click on image to enlarge. I looked up more facts about spiders, plus had a great tour of glossy spider photos, in The Audobon Society Field Guide to North American Insects and Spiders.