"Winter" Arachnids In The Ice and Snow?

[StrangerThanFiction]

So after my interesting summer of locating Northern Scorpions in the extreme northern tips of it's range here in the British Columbia Interior, I had begun to settle down for the relatively harsh winters here in Canada (Still nothing compared for even more northern communities). Typically I would be spending this time doing research on new critters to search for and take pictures of next summer. Been roughly a month of bellow freezing and have had snow with frigid winds to boot coating everything. However during an outing today I discovered a small spider on the edges of it's silk laced burrow still alive; the strange aspect being it's burrow seemed to have been dug directly into the snow beneath a lone pine tree. I was aware of various scorpion flies and fleas being present during our cold months but was unaware any arachnids could remain active in the face of such desolation. Unfortunately I did not have the proper camera set-up with me for such a minute picture against a shining white backdrop of snow (I'm sorry!!!). It darted into it's little burrow and down below the snow when my crunching boots got closer but was really curious as to what it could be. I will be returning when weather permits to attempt pictures however I am intrigued for any information you folks may have on the unusual little guy.

 

[chanda]

Here's an interesting article about winter-active spiders https://www.google.com/amp/s/seabrookeleckie.com/2010/02/05/snow-spiders/amp/

It contains a link to another article (a PDF) that talks about 54 different spider species in central and southern Canada that are active in snow/winter.

 

[USMuscle9403]

Here in the Southern US, broad faced sac (Trachelas) and yellow sac (Cheiracanthium) spiders are especially active during the winter. The cold doesn't slow them down one bit.

 

[schmiggle]

Here in the Southern US, broad faced sac (Trachelas) and yellow sac (Cheiracanthium) spiders are especially active during the winter. The cold doesn't slow them down one bit.

As if it gets cold in SC

 

[Jaboyd2u]

This is really interesting! I would have bet no arachnid would be able to live in such cold! I am in Florida so it doesn't get cold here often. ( Or ever according to most "Northerners" ) however I know my bees don't like the cold. even tho I know theyre not the same species I assumed they'd be close to the same in cold weather. I will have to be more observant now thru the winter to see what all spiders I can find.