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Home » Guide » Arthropods (Arthropoda) » Chelicerates (Chelicerata) » Arachnids (Arachnida) » Spiders (Araneae) » True Spiders (Araneomorphae) » Entelegynae » Unidentified Spiderlings/Juveniles
Photo#298747
spider egg sac
Copyright © 2009 John Pearson

spider egg sac
Ackworth, Warren County, Iowa, USA
July 4, 2009
Size: 4 mm diameter
I found a soft, brown, fuzzy hemisphere covered with wiry webbing on a leaf of an ornamental pin oak tree in my rural yard. An egg sac? This photo shows it with the original webbing still in place, which I removed for the next photo. I saved the leaf in a jar, so will see if anything comes out.

Images of this individual: tag all
spider egg sac spider egg sac spider egg sac spider egg sac spiderling
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Contributed by John Pearson on 4 July, 2009 - 11:46am
Last updated 20 January, 2015 - 7:34am

Moved
Moved from Entelegynes .
… Lynette Elliott, 20 January, 2015 - 7:34am login or register to post comments

Moved
Moved from Spiders.
… Lynette Elliott, 23 August, 2009 - 1:19pm login or register to post comments

Moved
Moved from ID Request.
… John Pearson, 22 July, 2009 - 12:46pm login or register to post comments

moth?
It belatedly occurred to me that this might the egg mass of a moth instead of a spider.
… John Pearson, 4 July, 2009 - 1:44pm login or register to post comments

 
spiderlings!
On July 4, I photographed the egg sac for the first time (with and without webbing cover; first three photos).

By July 13, the egg sac had deformed somewhat, appearing to dessicate and break open slightly on one side (fourth photo).

On July 20, I noticed that the jar containing the jar containing the egg sac was populated with a small galaxy of tiny dark dots suspended within a network of nearly invisible webbing. Each dot was a spiderling ~1 mm in size, about 100 spiderlings in all. I photographed one individual with a microscope camera on July 21 (after chilling the live specimens overnight), generating three images with slightly different digital contrast effects (last three photos).

The photos of the spiderling are not high-quality, but does anyone recognize the species?
… John Pearson, 21 July, 2009 - 10:38pm login or register to post comments

 
spiderlings
Both the egg sac and the spiderlings look like Araneidae to me--which still leaves many possible species. The markings on spiders can change a lot between instars, and it seems that spiderlings rarely get identified here. It would be great if you were able to raise a few to adulthood...
… Charley Eiseman, 22 July, 2009 - 8:08am login or register to post comments

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