I had been hanging around with a spider all fall, well she was literally hanging by a thread, upside down a lot, I think, but I was never quite sure where her eyes were. As my own little citizen science project, I was photographing her to identify her, but also monitoring her and other life around my porch lights to see when they actually died as cold weather came on.
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| Neoscona |
The books say that spiders live just one season.
I watched her busily wrapping up victims like mummies or wrestling bugs to death. Sometimes windstorms blew her web away, but she would have it rebuilt in a couple of days. After a couple of frosts, the web was down to a strand and then nothing at all.
Eventually she huddled underneath the porch light. Once, she was gone and I thought that was it. Then she re-appeared in the same spot. After that I could no longer tell if she was dead or alive. I didn’t want to touch her to see, because I’m too much of a softie to distrurb any creature.
As it got even colder, she seemed dead, hers legs held tightly to hers body, like a clenched fist. Then we had our surprise early snowfall of 1.6 inches. I checked the next day and she was not there. Then I had the wild idea of searching for her body. If she literally dropped dead, her body might be right under the light. I looked down and sure enough there it was. It was easy to see on the white snow. Then I touched her at last.
Then on November 15, I sent one of her photos to spiders.us. The next day, I learned her name and gender, a female Neoscona crucifera. Looking her up in my “Spiders and Their Kin” Golden Guide, All I could learn there was that she is ½ long and found in the eastern United States.
I need to find if a guide to Ohio’s spiders exists—I find it easier to identify creatures with local guides, and I’d expect more information than I get in the Golden Guide. In the meantime, I’ll make my small contribution and gradually create a photo album of the 13 spiders I’ve identified in my yard and neighborhood since I started spending a lot of time in Ohio about 1 ½ years ago. Nearly all the identifications were made by participants at spiders.us.
At times I thought most of the people seeking spider id’s were afraid of the spiders found in their homes. But most of those doubts disappeared when I sent in my request for Neoscona’s id and mourned her passing.
Instead of laughing at me, this inspired others on the website to share similar feelings along with their id information, like these:
“And I grew attached to one this season as well.. Called her "orbi"... [I guess for orb weaver spiders.]
“Yep, she's quite the looker too. It's a shame she had to die like that, but alas, such is nature. To live, is to one day die. But to one day die, is to one day bring forth new life.”
I also got this informative response to my question about how long spiders live, since I was seeing spiders like Neoscona alive after a couple of frosts and I’m seeing ladybugs and other spiders still alive on a warm day after the first real snow of the season here in central Ohio:
“Bugs are cold blooded (that's a generalization - "blood" is a relative term as the body fluid in bugs varies). A lot of them just slow down or stop moving all together when it gets cold - many can survive this for short periods. A warm day, they all come out and stock up on nourishment. Most of them are hiding out in warm places like piles of leaf litter or under ground (or in heated, man-made structures, those clever beasts) (sighted a hungry looking wolf spider yesterday that's probably been camping out in our garage or in the wall). It's freezing they can't survive (some of them can actually!) - especially a long freeze like several days or weeks of snow or freezing temps. Other bugs have such quick life cycles that a warm day causes eggs to hatch and they go about their business while the getting is good.”
Which brings me back to citizen science or Nature science, wondering if students or adults could do a science experiment to see how long the bugs they’re observing live? One of the things I’m hoping to do in this blog is to list ideas for science projects or science experiments anyone can do that will help professional scientists and further conservation of plants and wildlife. I welcome any help in this.
Links:
Spiders "Citizen Science" Link
Links:
Spiders "Citizen Science" Link
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