One of the challenges of this blog is that I have people who read the blog saying, "I don't get the rabbits, but I do enjoy the birds." Or I have people telling me that they disapprove about all the birds and demand more bunny. You know, I have had two people in two separate states tell me they are president of Cinnamon's Fan Club and have had no one ever tell me they are president of the birdchick fan club. So...how on Earth shall I toe this tenuous line of birds and bunnies in this blog entry?
With this:
Warning! If you didn't care for the post about the spider in the wren house last week, you are indeed not going to enjoy this post at all. Scroll down at your own risk. I do have to chuckle, I have been having trouble loading photos into this post all day--perhaps blogger is not happy with spiders as well? This entry is not for the faint of heart.
I think I'm getting past my spider discomfort from writing in Mr. Neil's Gazebo. They are everywhere in there! I found a photo card from last week that I forgot to download and it was chock full of spidey photos that I chronicled. Since he writes in here, I can see why spiders are so prominent in Anansi Boys (also lots of good bird references in that novel too).
Webs are everywhere and one night a spider covered the door knob with a fresh web. I had a heck of a time as I tried to get the door open without touching the web.
When I finally opened the door, the spider popped out from under the knob and dropped on the ground--with a THUD. It was big enough to create a thud sound--eeeeew. There was a green crayon that I tried to put next to the spider for scale, but it didn't seem to care for the crayon and I didn't want to anger it. Speaking of big I noticed that there was a ball in one of the corners of the gazebo.
Upon closer inspection it revealed itself to the the exoskeleton or outer layer of a spider. Here you can see where the legs fit inside.
Here the exoskeleton is attached to a twig and that is my pinky finger next to it for a size comparison.
This was about the time I realized that if the exoskeleton was this large, how big is the spider now...and where exactly is it lurking in the gazebo? Ack! Above, you can see the hatch popped off and you can see the eyes, it looks like there are four. I'm fascinated and grossed out all at the same time.
While searching through photos for the Adventure Pages I came across this wolf spider carrying hundreds of young on her back. I had heard of this, but had never actually seen it. I took this photo from one summer when I volunteered to help Blanding's turtles cross the road during egg laying season. We would encounter box turtles, map turtles and snapping turtles on their way to lay eggs besides just the Blanding's. At one point, this spider decided to cross the road. I decided to apply the snapping turtle rule to the wolf spider--hands off!
That should be the last of the spiders in the blog for awhile.