Jumping Spider of a New Variety, Found in the Kitchen Sink Tonight

...and then liberated on my desk after our photo shoot. I've never seen such a spider face! I think she looks very much like a Texas horned lizard.

My Herringbone Spider

I looked up a moment ago to see a little spider high on the wall here in the office, and was happy to see that it was this guy (gal?) again! He (she?) keeps coming around. I first saw it in the kitchen on May 23d. Then about a week later, I found it in the kitchen again, but this time sort of fastened by webbing onto an old receipt that tucked into a bowl on the counter :


The spider was under the web, not on it, and it seemed quite immobile. I showed it to Hugh and then put it down on my desk, and later the spider was gone, only to be seen again later that same day over on Hugh's desk:


Its head is a little blurry, but you can see how the back section looks sort of rubbed off in the middle and more orange on the sides than it was before. It's such an unusual spider—I've never seen one before, unlike some kinds of jumping spiders which are all over the place—that I can only think it has been the same one every time. What was it doing under all that webbing?

Nature in Action: Spider Eats Moth

I watched this jumping spider (possibly Platycryptus undatus or Metcyrba taeniola) stalk and kill this moth in the outdoor shower today while I washed my hair. The spider is larger than most of the other jumping spiders I've seen around here; it was perhaps half an inch long. It jumped right on the moth's head as the moth was clinging to the rock wall of the shower; by the time I'd rinsed and dried enough to run for the camera, the moth had been flipped over by the spider, as seen in these photos.


If you click to enlarge these two second photos, you will see a drop on the spider's back. Not sure if that's a drop of water from the shower or some bizarre spidery thing about which I know nothing.

Yet Another Spider

Also from Friday the 13th. I'm noticing that there are many tiny (little-fingernail-sized long, that being, in my case, about 1/3 or 1/4 of an inch) garden spiders of this general shape and makeup. I've just realized that this guy seems to be the very same type (or same one, for all I know) as this spider from a couple of weeks ago.

Another Spider

Front and eyes

He also came visiting while I woodpecker-watched on Sunday. Size approximately the same as my little fingernail—1/4" long or so.


Side view


From the back


Front again

The Wee Hunter

Or, My Spider Friend

This wee spider I found in the meadow on the little table out there. He was fascinating to watch; he kept pouncing on things (bugs, and sometimes things he just thought might be bugs) and grasping them between those two very long front legs. Until I looked at the photos, I didn't see his eyes. They're amazing!


8.23.2008 update:
This is a jumping spider, Hentzia palmarum (Hentz).


He was well aware of my presence and kept looking up at me like this. He is very like a tiny, tiny crab.






This photo was taken underneath the table with the flash. It shows the eyes in a very different way, though the coloring of the other shots is much truer to life.


My trusty penny for scale