A few hornets were building a nest up in the corner by the front door. I managed to snag one of them before shooing them away and dropped it onto Shelob’s web.
I was quite impressed with how fast she ran down to the trapped hornet and wrapped it up in a cocoon of silk. Even more surprising is that she actually wraps it up with a sheet of silk, not just individual strands.
She put on a pretty impressive show. I’ll have to catch more bugs and try to get a movie of the action.
Golden silk orbweaver
Another spider that seems to be fairly common around here. They spin some pretty large and spectacular looking webs. Also called banana spiders (nephila clavipes). The photo is a little bit on the blurry side because she was kind of high up and a breeze kept blowing her around a little bit.
Spinybacked Orbweaver
Spotted this spider on my way to the car as I was leaving work today. I’m pretty sure it’s a spinybacked orbweaver (gasteracantha cancriformis). I thought it was really cool looking. I couldn’t get around the other side to get a picture of the dorsal (top) side though.
This is the underside of the spider (ventral view).
Here it is from the side.
Beating on the Bahamas
Hanna has been lurking on and near the Bahamas for the last few days now as a Category 1 hurricane. The NHC forecast has it starting to move along the island chain, and eventually reaching the Charleston area as possibly a Category 2 or 3 hurricane by the end of the week.
Next week, the Bahamas may be in for more of the same from Ike. Still far too early to tell if Ike will be affecting the southeast or heading into the Gulf, but it’s another one to keep a close eye on.
Then as if to remind everybody that August/September really is the peak of hurricane season, TD10 was designated with the 5AM update. it’s currently located just south of the Cape Verde Islands, but may become Josephine in the next day or so.
If you haven’t started doing so already, I’d say it’s time to start prepping things and battening down the hatches.
What is it #2
Spiders seem to be getting pretty comfortable around the house. Spotted this neat green/yellow/white one up in the corner. Not sure what variety it is.
Update: A little more research and finding a few more similar looking specimens leads me to believe that this is an orchard orbweaver (leucauge venusta)