Friday, June 14, 2013

Lined Orbweaver

I discovered this pretty little spider in a orb web tied to one of our miniature fir trees. Unfortunately she was swept away in the storm we had that evening. A Lined Orbweaver (Mangora gibberosa), she had a black trident pattern running across her white abdomen, with yellow and black stripes on the sides. Her translucent cephalothorax and spiky legs were greenish-yellow. When I came along she was feeding, but she soon crawled up her "line of retreat" (forgive the pun) to a branch of the fir and waited till I left. So far she's the only specimen I've found, but I'll keep looking.

You can see the ventral black lines on femora I & II.

References:
http://bugguide.net/node/view/35280
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/3705737?uid=3739896&uid=2&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21102320482351 (web orientation)
http://www.fnanaturesearch.org/index.php?option=com_naturesearch&task=view&id=637

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