Greetings,
I just wanted to share my newest stowaway rescue story: a beautiful
Latrodectus hesperus that hitched a ride into Ontario on a bunch of grapes to be sold in a grocery store.
First, this arachnid is absolutely amazing! The tensile strength of their web is incredible (in fact, the silk is used for the cross-hairs in some rifle scopes). She is a voracious feeder: I will put a cricket in the freezer for a few seconds to slow it down and then I will wind the cricket in her web, as the cricket warms up and starts kicking she is alerted and quickly encases it in silk and spends the rest of the day externally digesting it and sucking up the contents. Another thing I find interesting is how active they can be, as is the case when I give her a weekly misting. She will roam her quarters and ingest any small water droplet she can find! Very neat.
Anyway, enough rambling, here are some pics:
For those interested in a quick taxonomy lesson (I find this very interesting), I have a photo of her underside that aided in my identification of
L. hesperus:
L. hesperus is also known as the Western Widow, they are blackish in colouration with the ventral red hourglass mark complete (no separation between the triangles). Also the anterior triangle part is usually longer and broader than the posterior triangle (as is evident in the photo). Also, there is no red spot above the anal tubercle (just above spinnerets) which is characteristic of
L. hesperus. The Western Widow occurs in the Western United States and Canada, which to me, is consistent with the likely origin of the grapes.
For comparison, I also just happen to have a nice underbelly shot of
Latrodectus mactans:
Now,
L. mactans usually has a separated hourglass mark, this girl doesn't (there is obviously some variation within populations). Also, the anterior triangle is usually more of a round rectangle than a triangle (as can be seen in the photo). Also this spider often has a red spot just above anal tubercle (just above spinnerets) (very evident in this photo).
L. mactans occurs primarily from Massachusetts to Florida and West to Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas, but is most common in Southern states (I found this girl in Virginia).
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the pictures and thanks for letting me ramble about the taxonomy, I just think it is very interesting to see the differences visually (instead of just reading about the differences between
L. hesperus and
L. mactans).....
Cheers,
RMB
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