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Daring jumping spider

Phidippus audax

Photo by KarenL
Published on Project Noah
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35.8987, -86.9624

Field Notes

Description:

The Daring Jumping Spider belongs to the genus Phidippus, a group of jumping spiders easily identified both by their relatively large size and their iridescent chelicerae. In the case of P. audax, these chelicerae are a bright, metallic green or blue.
These spiders have been known to jump up to 50 times their own body length by suddenly increasing the blood pressure in the third or fourth pair of legs and the male may jump away during mating if the female approaches too quickly.
Like other jumping spiders, due to their large, forward-facing eyes, they have very good stereoscopic vision. This aids them when stalking prey, and allows some visual communication with others of their species, such as courting 'dances'.

Notes:

This little guy lives between our mailbox & the post but is very camera shy! Today I managed to get this single shot of with his lunch (goldenrod soldier beetle) before he retreated back to the safety of his hiding place.

Species ID Suggestions

Comments (2)

Thanks Arun. Unfortunately I only got this single shot because I had forgotten to check if there was an SD card in my camera & this all I had room for on the internal memory!
Nice capture ..

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