Phidippus sp. in the field

[heyjeyniceid]

I decided to try my luck a few weeks back in the field with this freakishly warm winter we have been having to see if I could catch some tarantulas. In 2 hours I had found zero tarantulas but did find something unexpected.

Habitat(Arizona):

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v294/AdrianG4/AlittlebeforePayson.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v294/AdrianG4/AlittlebeforePayson1.jpg

At this time of year normally, theres good luck youll find tarantulas wintering under rocks. I flipped a few and found substantial amounts of these:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v294/AdrianG4/About20milesbeforePayson5.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v294/AdrianG4/About20milesbeforePayson4.jpg

Ive never found phidippus overwintering before so the first few I let alone until my desperation for anything arachnid led me to tear the silk open. Here I have gently removed some of the silk from the sacs. I HATED how these pictures turned out:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v294/AdrianG4/About20milesbeforePayson.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v294/AdrianG4/About20milesbeforePayson2.jpg

Emptying the silken sacs left me with a few of these little beauties:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v294/AdrianG4/outsideofPayson1.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v294/AdrianG4/outsideofPayson3.jpg

No tarantulas, but still left satisfied.

[liveprey]

Cool find and awsome photo documantation. I too went out a few weeks ago (Michigan) because it was so warm. I found some sort of funneling spider, no id. yet, and alot of very small also unknown sp.

I was looking for jumpers but to no avail. I could find the silken strands on the trees from where something was crawling but no specimen. I tried pealing bark and just found beetles.

Any idea as to specie? I have no "true spider books" yet.

[heyjeyniceid]

I have no idea what these are. They shouldnt be too hard to identify given their prevalence here in this state.

[liveprey]

Possibly Phidippus johnsoni.