Oval St. Andrew's Cross Spider Hatchlings
Argiope aemula
15.4562, 119.921
Field Notes
Description:
I have been making daily visits to this female Argiope aemula for almost two weeks. During that period, I have observed it being courted by two males. I have also seen her catching and wrapping several prey insects. She has also created a number of interesting stabilimenta (web decorations). All of these activities are very interesting to an Argiope fan like me, but the main reason that I have been so attentive is that she is very obviously gravid and I am keen to see the egg sac of this species. When I went to visit her, today, there she was, on her web and stil looking very swollen. I was thinking "When is she ever going to make an egg sac and fill it with eggs?" Then I saw, in the rice, just below the panicles (the seed heads) a group of tiny hatchling spiders. The more I looked, the more I saw until I was looking at hundreds of them. Continued in Notes below.
Habitat:
Spotted in a ricefield.
Notes:
The situation I was looking at with A. aemula was very different from that which I have seen many times with Argiope luzona. I have always seen the egg sacs of luzona close to the mother and usually (I think always) in her direct line of sight. When the babies emerge, they cluster near their egg sac in a dense, three-dimensional web of silk. The whole thing looks like a cloud of hatchlings. That is not what I saw today with these aemula babies. they were moving back and forth over a distance of about 3 or 4 feet on a kind of "skyway" - several long strands of silk attached at numerous points, along their length to the stems of rice, just below the panicles. One end of this "skyway" was very close to the web of the mother and I am pretty sure I could see one or two strands attached to its perimeter. The far end appeared to descend deeper into the rice and that might be where the egg sac was. The fact that the mother spider has been gravid during my two weeks of observations just means that she had produced the egg sac (that these hatchlings came from) some time prior to my first spotting her. I apologise for the rather vague description. The reason that I could not check everything, as well as I would like to, is that I was standing on a narrow turf dyke (rice field partition) and I was leaning over to try and see as much as I could, without actually stepping into the rice crop. If I had stepped into the mud of the rice field, I would certainly have done some damamge to the rice, but I would probably also have damaged the "skyway" of the hatchlings. At least, I have some basic notes and I can add to them or make corrections going forward. And it was all great fun!
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