Ant mimic jumping spider

Moved

… Chad Heins, 16 January, 2016 - 9:46am

Although I'm not familiar with this species . . .

it seems close to some images on BG of male Sarinda hentzi. Kaston's (Spiders of Connecticut) describes S.h. with the front part of the cephalathorax as being higher than the back part - the one being separated from the other by a "deep cervical groove." Also he describes the abdominal constriction as distinct in males and "somewhat in front of the middle." These characteristics seem consistent with what I see in your images.

… Dick Walton, 15 February, 2012 - 8:12pm

Jay Barnes posted a series of images of

Sarinda hentzi and mentions "on the dorsal abdomen are the two lateral oblique lines that start about 1/3 the abdomen length from its anterior"

See:http://bugguide.net/node/view/136550

Does the radical slant to the pedicel in Jay's images look the same as with your spider? In my experience the translucent palps occur on imm. males.

… Dick Walton, 16 February, 2012 - 7:45pm

The other spots

The slant I meant is from carapace to pedicel (http://bugguide.net/node/view/136552), but if it is immature I suppose that could change some. The spots I mentioned are directly between the posterior eyes (though there are additional spots on the abdomen) as in http://bugguide.net/node/view/575408, but again I have seen some dramatic color/pattern changes from juvenile to adult. Do you know what stage they overwinter in (though this may change with climate)? I do note that the preliminary checklist for the jumping spider species distributed in GA (G. B. Edwards and Douglas A. Rossman. A preliminary checklist of Georgia Salticidae. PECKHAMIA 1(2): 27-31, 1981.) does not include any members of the Synagelinae (unless I am missing some synonymy in the names) but do include Sarinda hentzi.

… David A. McKinney, 16 February, 2012 - 8:30pm

A behavioral clue may be of some help. Cutler (1987)

in his Revision of Synageles points out that most salticid ant mimics use the front pair of legs to mimic antennal movements, while Synageles and Peckhamia use the second pair of legs to this end.

You can see a video example of this at:

http://www.rkwalton.com/salticids/Synageles_noxiosus.php

I do not know the specifics of their overwintering stage.

… Dick Walton, 16 February, 2012 - 10:15pm

Well that clears things up

The video was a great help, my spider certainly did use the second pair of legs moveing like the Synageles that was in the video. That means that it is likely in this group Thanks! I will post another picture that shows the middle leg up in mimic like fashion.

… David A. McKinney, 17 February, 2012 - 8:11am

I think you were correct from the get go on Synageles.

I have been looking at the Sarinda images more carefully and both the proportions of the cephalic and thoracic plates as well as the posterior eye position seems very distinct and unlike Synageles. There are two species of Synageles that look very similar and are sympatric (with GA well within their range). Any chance you have the specimen? I'm sure one or both of the co-authors of the Georgia paper would be interested.

… Dick Walton, 19 February, 2012 - 8:51pm

Specimen

Unfortunately not, the little gut hid in a rock crevice while I was trying to get some better shots of him. Thanks again for your help with this one.

… David A. McKinney, 20 February, 2012 - 6:16am

Looks similar, but ...

Yes it is similar, but the palps on this one are very different (female?) and none of the Sarinda listed have the two white marks between the posterior lateral eyes. The prosoma is also abruptly slanted to the pedicel (see the blurry image I just added), which is not the case for Sarinda.

… David A. McKinney, 16 February, 2012 - 7:11pm