Sunday, August 28, 2011

The owner of the web

As I went out to get some wood for our wood stove last night, I saw a silhouette in the waning evening light on the reconstructed web I took pictures of the other morning:
Silhouette

With the help of my wife holding a flashlight, I was able to get these pictures of it:

Nighttime hunter


Imposing


Other worldly

From what we could determine, it is an orb-weaver spider. While it is quite imposing, it apparently is not particularly dangerous, although some sources ascribed some nasty bites to it. On the plus side, they consume a lot of pesky insects, including mosquitoes. We'll just call it a good neighbor and leave it right where it is.

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