L. geometricus Egg Sac in the Making (Pictures/Video)

[davisfam]

Thank goodness we decided to be night owls tonight because we we're able to catch our L. geometricus go through the complete process of forming her egg sac. It was such a neat thing to watch so we took as many pictures as possible without disturbing her. We we're also able to catch a short video of her actually "pumping" her eggs into the sac; the quality is not that great but it's still a decent video overall.. enjoy widow lovers!!

Pictures:

FINISHED EGG SAC!!

Video:
* We will be posting the video later on because it is taking awhile to upload onto the website, thanks for your patience! We promise you won't be upset, it's such a neat process to watch!

* Also, we have even more pictures and another small video if anyone is interested, just please let us know! Thanks! =)

 

[insect714]

Excellent shots! :worship:

 

[Widowman10]

interesting! great shots.

weird though, that the eggs are that pink color.

 

[recluse]

Trade you hesperus for geometricus

 

[davisfam]

interesting! great shots.

weird though, that the eggs are that pink color.

Thanks!
It was such a neat experience to watch.. and I think the reason the eggs look drastically pink in color is due to using a flashlight and then bringing her inside our bathroom which has a colored bulb although the eggs were a redish-pink tint to both my fiance and I's naked eye so I don't know? :?

 

[H. laoticus]

I'm getting chills looking at those pics. Those spiders creep me out...not to mention the egg sacks.

 

[Widowman10]

yeah, cause a buddy and i only experienced problems with eggs (from certain species) when they were pink.

 

[davisfam]

yeah, cause a buddy and i only experienced problems with eggs (from certain species) when they were pink.

Ahh, what kind of problems?? That comment makes me nervous..

 

[zonbonzovi]

Neat series! I had no idea that they expelled the eggs in such an organized fashion.

 

[Widowman10]

Ahh, what kind of problems?? That comment makes me nervous..

not saying it will happen with yours

but with our 13-guttatus, pink-ish eggs always were bad.

 

[Widowman10]

from another site:

I've never seen widow eggs this color (pink) except for a failed attempt at a sac from my female menavodi that mated with a mactans.

This mactans was collected in Silver Springs a couple weeks ago. She was surrounded by about twenty geometricus of both sexes and all sizes. Pretty sad considering geometricus populations were next to nothing in the area several years ago.

Maybe these eggs are the result of a mactans geo cross. Mactans eggs are genrally yellowish as seen in other images in this thread, as well as most Latrodectus eggs.

The egg color is probably nothing more than variation among populations.

so who knows? you might get a great sac! please keep us updated on this. document slings and everything if you can.

 

[TheTyro]

The eggs look awesome... the resulting eggsac is even cooler!

And the only spider with non-yellow eggs that I've ever seen was the unidentified Dictnya that I took to Rod. The eggs looked bright red, like the spider! The eggsac was PUNY (looked like a sunny side up egg, with a red yolk XD) though, and the eggs never hatched. I think a drop of water got on the sac and messed it up.

 

[davisfam]

L. geometricus Egg Sac in the Making (The VIDEO!!)

Finally, here is the video of our female L. geometricus 'pumping' her eggs onto the egg sac. The quality is not that great, sorry. (Read Video Description)


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xaZp7vd3CUg


Enjoy!

 

[davisfam]

We woke up to find that our L. geometricus had not only one egg sac, as usual, but now she has TWO egg sacs. I changed her "home" to something a bit larger and more comfortable yesterday afternoon along with giving her a snack, of course. We are not sure if this is the reason for the new egg sac or what?? Does anyone have any ideas on this.. ? Most widows we have come across have always had more than one egg sac around; heck, I've seen some Mama Widows with 5 egg sacs. Is this normal? Can someone please fill us in?

Here is a picture of her with her new and old egg sac:

 

[Widowman10]

i had a buddy that had a geo produce 33 eggsacs. feed well and she'll continue.

 

[insect714]

I will also say that most of not all of the L. geo that I have kept have produced a min of 3 sacs each, and some of the wilds that I have come across in the area have 5-6 in the web.

 

[davisfam]

Wowzaa, thanks for the information fellas.. we appreciate it tons!

Update and Questions: Okaay, so our female L. geo has 3 egg sacs now. She created the third sac last night. I noticed this egg sac wasn't as pink in color as the first two egg sacs. I snapped a picture of the 3rd sac, I'll post if after I return from class tonight. The first sac should be "hatching" (if fertile) either tonight or tomorrow, can I seperate her from the egg sacs? Or will this cause too much trauma to the L. geo? I just don't want slings running around all over in the cage, unless it's impossible to remove the egg sac into a seperate "home".. ?? We try to keep life as natural as possible for our spidies so I don't want to upset our Mama widow. Please, any information regarding L. geo slings and this whole "birth process" would be very helpful, thanks!

 

[Widowman10]

take the sac out, you'll be very sorry if you don't...

 

[davisfam]

Ahh, thanks! We took all 3 egg sacs out of the L. geo's home and put them into their own comfortable habitat-type home. Is that okay??

 

[Widowman10]

yeah that will be fine. as long as there's no small holes for the slings to escape through...