A lighter topic this week: Spiders are beautiful! I know, some of you mightn’t think so at first glance, but give it a chance, look at the pictures in Ontario Nature’s “A Guide to Some of Ontario’s Spiders.” It’s too cold to go out for long, so take this indoor field trip, you’ll be glad you did, and, you’ll learn that spiders are fascinating, and beautiful to boot. Upon your epiphany (that spiders are indeed amazing and beautiful) you’ll be wanting to plan a few field trips to observe them this summer.
There is a brief section, with pictures, on the Cellar Spider, you know, the kind living in your basement, probably right now. Find out about it; you’ll be glad you did. To go along with the Cellar Spider, you can read about and view pictures of the House Spider, one of the most widely distributed spiders in the world.
Familiarise yourself with the Northern Black Widow Spider and the Candy Stripe Cobweb Weaver; although they are both lovely they are quite different. As an incidental tidbit, the Candy Strip is an alien originating in Eurasia. Who would not be enchanted to see the tiny, 2 to 3 millimeters long, Splendid Darf Spider with its black abdomen and reddish orange cephalothorax? It is truly “Splendid.”
Have a look at the large hunting spiders, for instance the Six-spotted Fishing Spider which can be up to 20 millimeters long. See the delicate striping and the six dots. Wow!
In addition, there is a two page opening introductory text nd a brief text for each spider. The index gives some idea of the breadth of the coverage:
Orb weavers, pg.4 | Long-jawed orb weavers, pg. 21 |
Cobweb weavers, pg. 26 | Cellar spiders, pg. 33 |
Sheet-web weavers, pg. 36 | Funnel-web weavers, pg. 43|
Meshweavers,pg. 48 |Hacklemesh weavers, pg. 49
Wolf spiders, pg. 52 | Jumping spiders, pg. 57|
Nursery web weavers, pg. 64 | Prowling spiders, pg. 73 |
Ground spiders, pg. 76 | Sac spiders, pg. 79 |
Antmimic spiders, pg. 82 | Running crab spiders, pg. 85 |
Crab spiders, pg. 90
By the time you get to the end, and you will, there is a much needed small section titled “How to Help Spiders.”
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