St. Nicholas/Volume 32/Number 2/Nature and Science/The Spider

by Samuel Francis Aaron

The spider without a snare.

Whenever we think of spiders we think of webs, large wheel-like stretches or bulky masses or dainty gossamers spread on the grass or in fence-corners. If the spider did not build its snare, how would it get its dinner? Spiders, like boys and girls, are generally anxious about dinner. Spiders are always on the lookout for a hearty meal, and as this means something to eat almost or quite as big as themselves, with somewhat epicurean tastes into the bargain, they must be ever seeking food. The snare-weavers follow best the good, poetic precept,

Seeking a Dinner.

A little jumping-spider, with nest in honey suckle-vine, sneaking on a fly. In this case the fly flew as the spider jumped, and it is doubtful if the little Attus could have held the Musca even if the latter had been fairly caught. Smaller flies, tree-hoppers, larvæ of small moths, gnats, midges, and the like are the common prey of this spider. Sometimes ie attacks insects larger than itself, but is seldom successful with big active flies.

“Learn to labor and wait”; but the little fellows that build no snares, that do not depend on waiting, must, if the temperature permits, be ever on the hunt. Let us see how they follow a revised precept—learn to labor and to “hustle”.

On the sunny side of this tree-trunk, on the old barn door, among the pine-needles, in the crannies of the stone wall, under the projecting end of the wooden steps, amid the evergreen honeysuckle on the south porch, in almost any half-sheltered, half-sunny spot, we shall have no trouble finding the little black jumping-spider Attus, that scientists have recently renamed Phidippus Tripunctatus, though the three spots to which the specific name refers are generally increased to five or more. This is the little tiger of the spider fraternity. So common and so active and so hungry is it that its list of victims grows very long indeed, even in its short lifetime, and generally they are of a kind that makes the little tiger a great and worthy friend of man.

A little black and spotted jumping-spider on guard.

He is between two honey suckle-leaves, Several of the eight bright eyes of the spider are looking at the intruder. The nest contains eggs.

Flies, bugs, very young crickets and grasshoppers, plant-lice, tree-hoppers, midges, gnats, small moths, and caterpillars—these and many others are its victims by the score and by the hundreds.

It, too, spins a web (what spider does not in some way?), a delicate, pure white, cottony bag; to shelter itself and eggs throughout the winter, and later, when the eggs hatch, its young, the little spiders, swarm all over the mother, and all through the thick web, reminding one of the old woman who lived in a shoe. Our little Attus will not venture far from home. Find one that seems a wanderer and hunt closely, and ten to one you will find the web near by, somewhere in a cranny or crack, under bark, under stones, in heads of wild carrot, in curled leaves, in the disused lock or latch of an old

The little black and spotted jumping-spider (Attus) and his nest under the latch of an old disused barn door

The nest in the hole from which the life had been taken was the one in which the spider found shelter, and when a straw was poked in on the other side the small occupant backed out this side, always, as is their habit, keeping its front eyes on the intruder. The nest in the chink between the door and the wall contained a batch of the spider‘s eggs.

door, or, like our little resident of the honey-suckle, between two leaves which the web strands have drawn partly together. Get a straw and poke it into one end of the web, Out pops the small proprietor from a slit in the other end, and, always turning face toward the enemy, prepares to beat a further retreat or stand and fight.

Samuel Francis Aaron.

Jumping-spiders attract our attention by their short stout legs, bright colors, big eyes. and quick movements.—E. F. B.