Life Is A Journey: God loves spiders.....

…and why wouldn’t He? After all, He created them as part of His awesome creation, and they have various purposes. Does this first one scare you? If you were a small insect, maybe.

Humpback Orbweaver

I realize that spiders don’t appeal to everyone. And they are not my favourite part of His creation, but I am becoming more intrigued by them! Certainly since Marie passed about two and a half years ago, I don't have my wife and best friend to do things with or for. Therefore I am spending more time out exploring God's creation, praising Him and worshiping Him throughout it, and of course trying to capture as many things as possible with my camera that He has gifted me. Sure I am still fascinated by birds, plants, moths, etc., but so many more things are available to enjoy and thank God for.

Here are a few details about spiders that you probably didn’t know about:

-there are currently over 42,000 species of spiders known worldwide, with more discovered regularly;

-in a good quality natural habitat, there may be hundreds of millions of individuals per acre!

-even on a lawn they may be more numerous than you realize. On one occasion when I hadn't cut the lawn for more than a week, this was what part of the lawn looked like in the morning. There were probably almost 50 of these webs scattered about. I'm not sure what species it was, and maybe there were more than one species.

-while some species are fairly easy to find, many more are under logs, under ground, etc.

-they are highly beneficial in controlling many insects, and they themselves become food for larger predators including ants, beetles, wasps, etc.

-the majority live less than a year, so they must be highly productive to maintain such incredible numbers;

-adult males spend most of their brief lifespan courting or mating with a female; and some of them end up being food for the female once they have mated!! Yikes!!

-although spiders have eyes, their main senses are via touch/vibration, which of course can be useful when an insect gets caught in a web. Apparently the sense of vibration can be so useful they can even determine what is caught in the web, so as to determine whether to venture out to feed on it.

-if you see a web, but no spider, follow some of the strands of the web to a leaf the web is attached to. If the leaf is at least partially rolled up, there likely is a spider hiding inside. In the next photo, the leaf was partially rolled up, and partially tied via silk thread, to an adjacent leaf and a spider had tucked itself inside.

-spiders are very good at waiting, especially if they sense a predator may be nearby.

-they have 8 legs, so are not in the same order as insects, which have six legs. Spiders are in the class known as Arachnids. And having so many legs can be handy if they happen to lose one or two, so they can still function! The spider below is a Six-spotted Fishing Spider, and seemed to be quite capable of functioning normally even though it had lost two of its legs, and both on the same side.

-they will sometimes come to my black-lighting sheet when I am out trying to attract moths, as there are many small insects that could be sources of food for them to choose from. This first one, a Big-eyed Thick Jawed Spider was chowing down on some insect.

Brush-legged Split Wolf Spider

Furrow Orbweaver

Long-palped Ant Mimic Sac Spider

And this next one is a Six-spotted Fishing Spider, which has all eight legs.

The Six-spotted Fishing Spider is larger than many other spiders, and can get around in various habitats. This next one was walking on a mat of green moss on a small pond. With so many legs, they can distribute their weight and walk on the water.

One of the main things that people associate with spiders is webs. Of the North American spiders, about 54% produce webs. The design of some webs are species specific and can apparently even be useful to determine the species. One of my favourite memories goes back a few years when I was at Walpole Island First Nation with someone from their Heritage Centre. We were at one of the high quality tallgrass prairies early one morning, attempting to find an endangered nesting sparrow. We got out shortly after sunrise, and it was a very quiet, calm morning with heavy dew.

The tall grassy vegetation was sopping wet. Even though I had high boots, I was completely soaked from the waist down in just a few minutes. The spider webs were numerous and beautiful!

As the sun rose, the grass gradually dried up a bit, and the beauty of the tallgrass prairie became even more evident with impressive, rare wildflowers. I have been to Walpole numerous times over the years, for various purposes and have many great memories of this wonderful place. But no question, this experience was one of the most memorable.

Silk is a well-known part of the spider story, although certainly not for all species. However, there are various types of silk, and for various purposes. Silk is made up of liquid protein inside the spider’s body, and is excreted for different purposes. It is very elastic once it is excreted, and sometimes it allows them to descend from one branch to another. I have periodically seen a spider descending from a branch on a single strand of silk, gently blowing in the breeze until it reaches its lower destination. The silk can also be used as an anchor for the spider to be able to remain on its perch prior to deciding to descend.

One of the more common spiders I have encountered that are web makers is the fairly large and colourful Marbled Orbweaver. This first photo has not been cropped at all, and the spider was quite tolerant of my macro lens and flash only inches away.

Here is the underside of a Marbled Orbweaver.

Side view of Marbled Orbweaver

As mentioned, the silk is used for various purposes, not just for webs. They often excrete a little bit of silk everywhere they go, in case they want to descend, or just hang around while they search for something else to use or somewhere else to go.