Crab spider

Spider week - day 5

If you have been viewing the folio's too, I guess you will be spidered out after this week, but I am having a great time! Last chance to view day one folio, it gets deleted tomorrow.

I have blipped this type of spider before, back 0n 1st January and this is the first time that I have seen one since. I don't think they are classed as rare, they are just difficult to find. I got lucky the first time, when the strange looking creature decided to use my motorbike as a frame for its web.

I found today's crab spider while closely scanning the bushes for anything interesting. Spider week has been a bit of an eye opener for me, in that it has taught me to look more closely at the bushes. In the past I have been scanning widely, looking for larger insects, but to find spiders, you have to stare at one spot and examine every leaf.

This staring technique has revealed a whole new set of insects and I have been returning to the lab with twenty or more subjects, only a few of which are spiders. I am sure I will be able to find most of them again, to bring them to blip. Some, like the baby mantids are going to take a lot of practice to photograph. I have already fired off more than a hundred shots and not got one blipworthy image.

I am now seriously considering setting up a tabletop lighting studio, with a rotating table, so that when the insect turns, I can turn it back again. LED lights on flexible wire mounts. Still figuring out how to stop escapes, but the design is coming along. It is frustrating to shoot fifty images, end up with nothing and not be able to locate the bug the next day for a second shoot.

Not much to say about the crab spider, except that they look cute from a distance, but a bit gory up close. I was only able to get the underside view, so there are no extra shots to put in folio, so I am adding a selection of other spider shots that I collected today. A few more golden orb weavers, showing the amazing coloring of the web.

Dave