anyone got this?

[imported_kat]

I have had this guy build and tear down and rebuild in the last 2 days. I think spiders are amazing. Just don't want him in my hair.

The web in my back yard was close to 2 feet across. Watched the spider build it again tonight after him spending last night in it. It was gone this morning.
It took him about 45 minutes to do it again. It will probably be gone in the morning again. Makes me think....

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f0/SpiderWeb.jpg

This is a very, very close picture to the dude on my umbrella. It almost matches the ones I took with my camera.

(my spider doesn't glow... it is hard to get a "non glowing" picture in the dark. )

[Angie]

that sounds kinda cool! cant you record some of it somehow? do you have any idea how much money people make with that sort of thing on the "discovery" channel? i knwew spiders built webs but i didn't know that they tore them down and started over. i can't figure why they do that...

[bansaisequoia]

Lotr

kat, your spider problems could be much worse.


(we'll see how long this image lasts before New Line Cinema zaps it
for intellectual property infringement)

[imported_kat]

We will see...

Angie, I knew that some did, but until I came out this morning, I never had seen it for myself. It was crazy. A two foot wide orb web was there last night (I took pictures) and was gone this morning. More amazing was that the same spider (or his twin!) was back in the same spot and I got to watch him build a new web. WOW!

My question is, why did he not leave the old one up?

I suppose it served its purpose and he caught some dinner after I went to bed last night...

It is intricate and beautiful, but hard to photograph. The spider itself is a bit scary looking when you don't see it in the glowing aspect. monsterish, if you will...

[pootie49]

Hey

We have some incredible webs on our balcony and we too have noticed that they build them at night and in the morning they are gone...in looking it up on Google, this is apparently common to spiders who have excellent eyesight, they build them in the evening, then let them do their work of catching food, and when first light appears, they take them down and move to a dark area for the day, only to come out again at dusk to re-build.

Some will re-build two or three times within a space of an hour, and the only explanation that spider "scientists" can determine is, that the spiders just did not like them, and wanted to improve upon the last one.

Fascinating, although I am scared of spiders, they do help the mosquito problem.

Hope that helps Kat.

"I have drunk, and seen the spider" - William Shakespeare

It's from "The Winter's Tale," Act II, Scene I. The speaker, Leontes, believes that his wife has betrayed him and he is about to seek vengence.

[sonofcarc]

I believe the old web goes away because the spider actually eats it and reuses the material for the next one!

Just once, I have seen an orb-web spider in the act of building. They build the spiral framework, which is not sticky, first. Then they start in the middle and weave the sticky cross-thread back and forth as it comes out of the spinneret, touching it only with the tip of a leg. The whole web is made up of only two threads. Fascinating.

(I have it in my head that it's only the females that build, as only the female mosquitoes eat blood, and for the same reason -- they need more nutrients to lay eggs. But I could be wrong, or maybe it's only true of some species.)