noxylophone
Arachnopeon
- Joined
- Nov 23, 2014
- Messages
- 22
Hey everyone,
Very grateful to have found this forum—it appears to be a wealth of information and populated by knowledgable, articulate folks. Glad to be here.
I've been tip-toeing my way into the hobby gradually over the past year or so, mostly through the process of observing wild arachnids in my environment. I live in Seattle, WA, and we have quite a variety of interesting spiders, including the ubiquitous A. diadematus.
Seattle's orb weavers have fascinated me since I moved here a few years ago, and I've taken to keeping track of the webs around my house and watching the spiders grow as the year goes on. About a week ago, I left the house and ran smack into the web of a fairly large weaver who had built her web at eye level directly in front of my door. I was kind of surprised—most of the population seems to have died off by this point in the year, and we've had several below-freezing nights in the past few weeks. Given this, I decided to fetch a jar and capture this late-season spider.
I know that orb weavers tend to stay put once they've found a decent place to set up shop, so I decided to let her loose in the corner of my room in the hopes that she'd spin a web for me. After about four days of hanging out in the corner and occasionally putting out single lines of web, she finally spun!
[YOUTUBE]7Oh7_k6bvaI[/YOUTUBE]
And here she is:
Now, I'm aware that this species only tends to live for a year, though I've heard of some who've overwintered. I'm reasonably sure this specimen is female, and she doesn't seem to be gravid based on the size of her abdomen. That said, I'd like to keep her alive for as long as possible.
Given that, I have two questions:
1) How often ought I feed her? I fed her the day she built her web, since I figured she could probably use some food after losing the one I knocked down and spinning a new one, but I don't want to overfeed or underfeed her.
2) What's the best way to water her? I got a little misting bottle, but the water doesn't really seem to bead on the web readily—it's a pretty fine mist. What beads did remain she showed no interest in. Is this something I should do at night (to simulate dew accumulation?)
Right now she seems pretty happy; she's on her second web and hasn't moved from the corner she crawled to after I released her.
Thanks!
EDIT: Welp, after posting, the forum gave me some handy links that answered my questions. Funny how searching didn't turn up the info I was looking for. Oops. Anyway, enjoy the picture/video, and feel free to chime in if you want.
Very grateful to have found this forum—it appears to be a wealth of information and populated by knowledgable, articulate folks. Glad to be here.
I've been tip-toeing my way into the hobby gradually over the past year or so, mostly through the process of observing wild arachnids in my environment. I live in Seattle, WA, and we have quite a variety of interesting spiders, including the ubiquitous A. diadematus.
Seattle's orb weavers have fascinated me since I moved here a few years ago, and I've taken to keeping track of the webs around my house and watching the spiders grow as the year goes on. About a week ago, I left the house and ran smack into the web of a fairly large weaver who had built her web at eye level directly in front of my door. I was kind of surprised—most of the population seems to have died off by this point in the year, and we've had several below-freezing nights in the past few weeks. Given this, I decided to fetch a jar and capture this late-season spider.
I know that orb weavers tend to stay put once they've found a decent place to set up shop, so I decided to let her loose in the corner of my room in the hopes that she'd spin a web for me. After about four days of hanging out in the corner and occasionally putting out single lines of web, she finally spun!
[YOUTUBE]7Oh7_k6bvaI[/YOUTUBE]
And here she is:
Now, I'm aware that this species only tends to live for a year, though I've heard of some who've overwintered. I'm reasonably sure this specimen is female, and she doesn't seem to be gravid based on the size of her abdomen. That said, I'd like to keep her alive for as long as possible.
Given that, I have two questions:
1) How often ought I feed her? I fed her the day she built her web, since I figured she could probably use some food after losing the one I knocked down and spinning a new one, but I don't want to overfeed or underfeed her.
2) What's the best way to water her? I got a little misting bottle, but the water doesn't really seem to bead on the web readily—it's a pretty fine mist. What beads did remain she showed no interest in. Is this something I should do at night (to simulate dew accumulation?)
Right now she seems pretty happy; she's on her second web and hasn't moved from the corner she crawled to after I released her.
Thanks!
EDIT: Welp, after posting, the forum gave me some handy links that answered my questions. Funny how searching didn't turn up the info I was looking for. Oops. Anyway, enjoy the picture/video, and feel free to chime in if you want.
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