The Demise of a Spider

Recent mornings have been a bit too chilly to enjoy my coffee on the front porch.

As well, we seem to have been too busy to sit still for long.  It has been a week or more of hitting the floor running [or hobbling grumpily in my case.]

Since the two spiders created their webs by the front steps I have kept an interested eye on their activitites.

The busy spider, she of the four egg sacks, has kept her web tidy with a snack or two rolled in silk and waiting to be absorbed as a meal.

It was with surprise that I noted the web was empty on Thursday morning.

I knelt on the grass and gently moved aside the bowed stems of sedum, expecting to find the spider intact, but shriveled and brittle.

I found a bit of black and yellow patterned husk which might have been her remains.

By the weekend I noticed that the "sister" spider was busier than she has been during her time in the second web about a foot deeper in the clump of sedum.

To my surprise I discovered that she had spun an elaborate 'bridge" between the two webs and was neatly reparing the deserted web.

She now appears to be exclusively using her sister's web.

I wonder if she will produce more egg sacks.

It is cooler tonight on the heels of a rain shower.

Time is running out for the insects which have flitted and whirred and crawled around and through our space during the summer months.

The butterflies have disappeared.

The scraping song of the cicadas sounds only faintly on a warm afternoon.

The two spiders [argiope aurantia] have provided a delightful interest.

Perhaps their "babies" will continue a generational residency by the porch steps come spring.

The look of a fall morning.

The spider webs are just out of sight where the walk stops at the porch steps.

Argiope Aurantia

Until this morning this has been "the black and yellow spider who makes zig-zag stitching in her web."

It is amazing what one can learn from the internet!

Two of these female spiders have spent the past month in webs near our front porch steps.

The one above has her web centered in a large clump of sedum which wants dividing [which I haven't done as it hosts a flourishing poison ivy.]

On Sunday morning she had two well-wrapped meals awaiting her pleasure.

This lady spider looks full to bursting, but I have not spotted an egg sack.

Perhaps she isn't quite ready to produce.

The male of the species is a tiny unremarkable creature.

He mates with the colorful large female--and then expires.

While I don't harbor ill will toward males--human or otherwise--it piques my fancy to think of this subservient and insignificant male--rather the opposite of the male birds who out-shine the drabber females.

The sister Argiope has her web fastened from the back edge of the sedum to the edge of the porch.

As I sat drinking my coffee in the nearby rocking chair, a large moth blundered into the web.

The spider plunged toward her victim, trailing a length of silk.  She had her lunch wrapped and secured in less time then it takes my sewing machine to wind a bobbin.

I was delighted to have witnessed  this moment.

Here she is with the newly packaged treat and a spare in the larder.

The lower egg sack appeared several days ago. This morning the spider was resting near a second egg sack attached to the pillar above the first one.

She seemed lethargic and rather deflated.

I read that the spiders produce one to four egg bundles late in the summer and their life cycle will come to an end with cooler weather.

Here she rests, possessively guarding her future spiderlings.

Last week I moved a pot of impatiens which is looking spent and unthrifty.

In a few days this rampaging self-sowed morning glory wrapped almost completely around the pot.

I've had to rip great throttling cords of convulvulus from the grape arbor.

These I have allowed to wander around the nandina and through the leaning hibiscus at the edge of the porch.

Leaving the spiders to their day, I walked around the porch to the old plantings at the side of the car port.  These too are troubled with poion ivy which survived my attacks on it in April.

So many tasks should be completed before the end of the season.

Some days, contemplating the "ought to do" list, I feel as deflated as my resident spider looks.

Here is an interesting article on the life and behaviors of Argiope Aurantia.

http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/galveston/beneficials/beneficial-24_spider_blackandyellow_argiope.htm

I noticed this morning that I hadn't included the link to the spider article.