Insects and Spiders

Faster than I'd hoped.

Venom aside I think this has to be the hardest.

Eats tarantula fo breakfast.

(It is venomous tho)

Those things can eat mice....

As first post shows.

Also bats, frogs, snakes etc

Camel spiders look pretty cute.

Note that camel spiders are not actually spiders.

Yes but they are arachnids. Go figure.

Correct. They are in fact related to these:

I used to work with a bloke we called arachnid - he was always scuttling around and spent most of his time on the world wide web.

Some lovely pictures here:

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/gallery/2017/jun/06/close-encounters-of-the-furred-kind-alien-butt-spider-and-friends-in-pictures

Of the British varieties the Woodlouse Spider is a pretty mean looking beastie. Given that it's evolved fangs to bite into woodlice I guess that's not surprising. Here's one we found in our garden recently.

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Catching some sun by the kitchen window

More spider bothering. Unfortunately, just missed getting the eyes in focus. In my defence, it was a bit windy and the spider was moving :-)

We've had babies

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Posted in the photo comp thread here's the original. A brown hawker.

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I love news like this:

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/feb/21/worlds-largest-bee-missing-for-38-years-found-in-indonesia

I just hope that it won't be made extinct in the wild by poachers ...

I'd love to observe this species.

About 15 years ago I found one of these in our garden. Well, I say found, I nearly got a face full of it. I froze in total disbelief, never having known they existed I was looking around for the hidden camera convinced someone was having me on.

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Just found this in my kitchen, about to be picked up by my daughter. Is it a 'false widow'? I know they're not dangerous as such, but I don't really want my 4 or 1 year old getting bitten as it's supposed to be pretty painful!

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Yeah, female steatoda grossa with that fat maroon arse. A few species can give a nip, not just the big maroon one. Normally people refer to s. nobilis as a false widow which has markings on its back which can sometimes look a bit skull like. Same genus though.
Equivalent of a red ant bite/bee sting at worse, probably wouldn't bite unless cupped in your hands/trapped in clothing.

Been watching a spider in my garden for a few days. She's great at catching hover flies but had to abandon her feast she had stashed under a pumpkin leaf to deal with this wise guy. I assume it's a male and she was having none of it, boxed him into next week.

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that’s interesting... thank you. I found similar-looking to that pic when lifting stones, removing rotten decking and generally fettling in a back garden. Wiki’d for something like it, but couldn’t find a match. Absurdly ‘all your spider nightmares’ spider-like spider!

This furry boi hanging out in our communal hallway.

Spotted a False Widow hanging out there the other day, too.

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It's obviously long been known that ants 'farm' aphids, but here's another instalment of that:

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jan/24/ants-run-secret-farms-on-english-oak-trees-photographer-discovers

I particularly liked this:

In return for plentiful supplies of honeydew – the sugary water excreted by the aphid – the ants herd the aphids, keeping them safe in “barns” they build on tree trunks from mosses, lichens and the exoskeletons of beetles.

Brimstones today

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And a jumping spider yesterday

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