Stacey's Web Development Co.

[The Snark]

@Ah Lee I'm equally interested in your metamorphosis along with the progeny. With your intense curiosity you will pick up on the details and development of them to the degree you may notice subtle traits that will differentiate the sexes before obvious physical characteristics occur.

At the pack station I went out to do the head count of the horses, dead of night, no moon. I innately was able to spot all of the 26 horses, just shapes and shadows, that were my charges plus an additional 5 that had just arrived. Pure innate familiarity. -> Big appy gelding, smallish roan gelding probably a yearling, and three additional mares.
(And snerk. The appy was strutting his stuff. My New Herd! Wait until dawn big guy, when you get to meet short, dark and gruesome, my stallion.)

 

[Ah Lee]

Pepper's new look



Little Pepper is no longer little, she molted into a vibrant display of color, very befitting for a CEO. Striking red legs with black tarsi, she's quite a sight to behold now as she props majestically on her web. She is actually larger than Stacey now!

And now for the most incredible part: she gave herself a gold crown.



I am absolutely baffled, I thought it was the lighting at first but now it is unmistakable. Half her carapace is showing the bright gold colors of the Nephila pilipes. I have never seen a color morph like this, whether in the wild or in photos online. Could she be a hybrid? Hopefully someone here can shed some light on how this might have happened.

Regardless, she is looking absolutely beautiful, from her gold carapace down to her black tibia, it's amazing how much she changed in this molt!

 

[Ah Lee]

Again, Skittles?



Whoopee doo, our extremely fertile chief web designer has just laid another eggsac. At this point I'm convinced she's just doing it so she can apply for maternity leave. I am just about to release the 2nd batch, so the incubator will be ready for these.



Mommy Skittles gets a huge dragonfly to get her energy back, her abdomen is always very deflated after egg-laying. Wait...maybe she's doing this for the food...

 

[Ah Lee]

Coffee's feeding update



Project fruitfly is a success! I have well over 30 flies in the container now. What I did next was replace the cover, rip the plastic wrap, placed a test tube on top and shook the container.



Their instinct is to escape upwards, and they get stuck in the test tube, so I get about a dozen each go, and released 2 batches into the cage. So far everyone has caught at least 1, but Coffee has surpassed everyone else with a 5-fly killstreak.

It's amazing watching her hunt, the flies don't stick well, but they tumble down the web in an attempt to escape. She chases them with incredible speed and captures them. Guess it's not just the web that does all the work!

She's terribly fat now, but no photos because my camera is survivng on it's last bar of battery, and my replacement charger hasn't arrived yet. I want to save the battery for when she molts again, which should be soon!

 

[The Snark]

Your efforts with Nephila remind me very much of our neighbors. Their back yard was surrounded on all sides by a tall hedge. Their residence was once the caretakers cottage of a large estate that experimented with hybrid and exotic trees. In their back yard was one such tree, in the center of the yard, a Fukien tea tree that had grow to about 12 feet tall and about 15 feet across.
The neighbor obtained a pair of Jackson horned chameleons and he wanted to provide them with a perfect near natural habitat. So he went into the back yard and manicured the tree. Trimmed it away from the hedge then meticulously trimmed all the branches until the foliage was thin enough to be able to spot the profile of the chameleons when looking up through it. Literally hundreds of hours of trimming - essentially turning the tree into a gigantic bonsai. Then he released the chameleons into the tree. Tidbits of fruit attached to the branches attracted the assorted insect for the animal's food.
Keeping the tree neatly trimmed about a year later the pair produced over 30 offspring.

 

[Ah Lee]

Your efforts with Nephila remind me very much of our neighbors. Their back yard was surrounded on all sides by a tall hedge. Their residence was once the caretakers cottage of a large estate that experimented with hybrid and exotic trees. In their back yard was one such tree, in the center of the yard, a Fukien tea tree that had grow to about 12 feet tall and about 15 feet across.
The neighbor obtained a pair of Jackson horned chameleons and he wanted to provide them with a perfect near natural habitat. So he went into the back yard and manicured the tree. Trimmed it away from the hedge then meticulously trimmed all the branches until the foliage was thin enough to be able to spot the profile of the chameleons when looking up through it. Literally hundreds of hours of trimming - essentially turning the tree into a gigantic bonsai. Then he released the chameleons into the tree. Tidbits of fruit attached to the branches attracted the assorted insect for the animal's food.
Keeping the tree neatly trimmed about a year later the pair produced over 30 offspring.

Omg you hit the nail on the head. That sounds like a dream, and exactly the kind of thing I would do! Props to your neighbour for pulling it off!

Already I am planning for a spider corner when redo my bathroom in the future. Basically an entire wall with live plants and space for a Nephila web. Bathroom just seems perfect for such a project because I can maintain a high humidity without destroying anything. Only downside is they have to bear with the stench of my poo

 

[The Snark]

With what you are already doing combined with the knowledge gained so far, it sounds like the situation has serious potential. At a temple which took over a nature preserve, under the main roof of the services and business building there was about 75 medium large orb type weavers in what amounted to a community environment. With Nephila being essentially peaceful towards their fellow Neph neighbors I would hope for a similar situation. Certainly worth working towards.

PS To the best of my knowledge, the only arachnids that might have a sense of smell were cells found in the leg joints of L. Hesperus that resembled olfactory cells. Thus a possible explanation of why they are attracted to bathrooms and outhouses. Even disused outhouses in desert environments without any moisture present.

 

[Ah Lee]

Coffee's rise to power

~It seems that after studying arachnology and getting a small headstart in life, Coffee has taken over the babies' tank.~

Today I released the 2nd batch. They had mostly molted a 2nd time, and were more active than the first batch when I released them. I think I had done a good job with them!



The area I released them to was in the heart of the rainforest, with lots of little flying things for them to feast upon.

It was then I noticed a mushroom colony absolutely swarming with fruit flies. I swiped the babies' old home and caught about 7-8.



I realised they were not fruit flies, but slightly fatter, with a "beak". What was awesome was that they were the terrible fliers @The Snark talked about. By just knocking the container against the table, they all fell into a neat little pile at the bottom. Upon realising this, I cut a hole in the container, and easily transferred them into a test tube.

They didn't fly much, but when they did, they got trapped pretty easily.

Now this is the part I realised I have a problem. Coffee was eating everyone's food.

She is the largest, and her web the largest (and most effective it seems) now. She has caught 2 so far, the 2nd largest has caught 1, the rest have caught nothing.

This is her finishing off the first one. She is now eating her 2nd one as I type this, and is ballooning so much I think she's gonna burst.



One of her lucky siblings stays below her, and always manages to get leftovers because it's web is directly below Coffee's hub. This means that Coffee isn't even finishing her meals completely. Her downstairs neighbour is actually thriving on Coffee's leftovers.

But you can still see how much smaller it is.



This is very interesting to me though. I can see how much the scales tip in favor of those who have had a small headstart in their lives. It's natural selection, within a 1ft x 1ft box. I need to devise a way to feed the others, but again I believe it's a numbers game. Coffee can only catch so much!

I will be returning to the mushroom spot again to see if I can get more, even cultivate them. Meanwhile my fruit fly culture has gone putrid and I needed to discard it, it'll take a while for the next one to bloom, so it's cricket legs and pollen for now.

If anyone knows anything about these flies, your input is much appreciated!

 

[Ah Lee]

With what you are already doing combined with the knowledge gained so far, it sounds like the situation has serious potential. At a temple which took over a nature preserve, under the main roof of the services and business building there was about 75 medium large orb type weavers in what amounted to a community environment. With Nephila being essentially peaceful towards their fellow Neph neighbors I would hope for a similar situation. Certainly worth working towards.

PS To the best of my knowledge, the only arachnids that might have a sense of smell were cells found in the leg joints of L. Hesperus that resembled olfactory cells. Thus a possible explanation of why they are attracted to bathrooms and outhouses. Even disused outhouses in desert environments without any moisture present.

That had always been lingering in the back of my mind. I know of at least one lab which keeps Nephilas together in a closed room, and it seem cannibalism isn't of a concern. But why did Stacey and Xiaohua fight to the death before? Because they are different in species? Some people believe the Nephila kuhlii to be just a color morph of the Nephila pilipes though. Are they even sensitive enough to tell if a potential intruder is of a slightly different color morph? So many questions, but I'm just really glad to be on this journey of learning

 

[The Snark]

But why did Stacey and Xiaohua fight to the death before? Because they are different in species? Some people believe the Nephila kuhlii to be just a color morph of the Nephila pilipes though. Are they even sensitive enough to tell if a potential intruder is of a slightly different color morph?

I have no idea who said this or in what circumstance, but it appears to apply. "Humans tend to assign attributes to animals they simply don't / cannot possess. No rational or reasoning thinking; when a primal instinct such as survival gets triggered that's it." So your question would be more apt if you asked what triggered the same primal function in two animals that are normally communal? The same could be asked why two dogs that have been amiable companions suddenly fight?
You could add to this by their normal day to day conduct Nephila can easily lull us into a sense of false security. They are after all extremely capable combatants as seen it their occasional taking on a bird trapped in their web.

This is very interesting to me though. I can see how much the scales tip in favor of those who have had a small headstart in their lives. It's natural selection, within a 1ft x 1ft box. I need to devise a way to feed the others, but again I believe it's a numbers game. Coffee can only catch so much!

Abundance of prey or food source. Probably the prime factor in natural selection. The more abundant and easily available, the greater the number of survivors. Certain termite species colonies will expand to cover several square miles with sufficient food sources. When food availabity drops off the colonies become islands. I once saw a computer overhead mapping of such a colony, much like a tide going in and out of a land mass at the edge of a tidal zone that turns into archipelago.

Coffee's rise to power

I think I'm starting to see some dimorphism in those pictures. The males keep the same coloration throughout their lives while with the females the colors become more vibrant.

 

[Edan bandoot]

PS To the best of my knowledge, the only arachnids that might have a sense of smell were cells found in the leg joints of L. Hesperus that resembled olfactory cells. Thus a possible explanation of why they are attracted to bathrooms and outhouses. Even disused outhouses in desert environments without any moisture present.

im pretty sure amblypygi contain olfactory cells in their whips

edit for links:
https://www.researchgate.net/public...p_spider_Phrynus_parvulus_Arachnida_Amblypygi

Error - Cookies Turned Off

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

.

unfortunately I don't have any way of reading the papers in their entirety, but their abstracts seem to confirm this

 

[Ah Lee]

I think I'm starting to see some dimorphism in those pictures. The males keep the same coloration throughout their lives while with the females the colors become more vibrant.

Nope that's not it, at least not that I can confirm yet. So far from what I'm seeing, they get darker with every molt. Coffee is 2 molts away from her downstairs neighbour, and looked the same when she was that size. From what I see in the Nephila pilipes, the males develop a different-shaped abdomen and markings early in their lives, and I think it might be similar for the Nephilengys malabarensis. Right now they are too small for me to even see much, but I'll keep observing and report back!

 

[Ah Lee]

Stacey Web Dev. Co. Company Update

Hello everyone, once again, when we have a title like this, it usually means quite a lot of excitement at SWDC. And indeed there is!

First off, the company has sent our human slave to check out the spot where we released hundreds of Skittle's babies. And after some searching, we are pleased to announce he has found a few of them!



The biggest one is a little larger than Coffee, and they make their homes amongst the tree bark. It's baffling, they make a crappy little tangle web on the tree trunk, and I have absolutely no idea what they eat or how they catch it, but they grew quickly! This is as best as I could get with my clip-on lens, I'll bring my camera next time.

Still I'm really happy to see at least a few of them are doing well, they also seem to have lighter-colored abdomens, which is strange, considering all of those I am keeping have dark ones.

Meet Tony

My next job was to kidnap employ a male secretary for Pepper, and after about 2 hours of searching, I found him!



I found him on an abandoned web, and to be honest I am not sure if he is even compatible with Pepper, but I didn't find any males on the very few Nephila kuhlii webs I found.



Pepper plucked her web when she sensed him, which seemed to scare him shitless because he refused to move for the next hour or so. I gave Pepper a dragonfly to distract her, and immediately the little thing scurried up.

Interestingly, he didn't scurry to her, but straight to her hub. He waited till she came back, and then hopped on. The interview is a success!



Their relationship quickly got very unprofessional, and soon they were sharing meals and making babies while having said meal. Very unprofessional, but Pepper is the CEO, and the CEO does what she wants.



Today I managed to see her ventral side, and I noticed she has the yellow spots on her knees like Stacey, and a strange redness on the underside of her abdomen. Again, none of the N. kuhlii I have seen have displayed such colors. I really do think she is a hybrid!

Coffee's 4th molt

In the intern's office, Coffee has molted once again, she is growing really well! But like Mommy Skittles, she is building a lattice web to protect herself, so it's getting hard to photograph her. I don't want to shift her tank for now, so here's one photo I managed to get!

 

[Edan bandoot]

Wow the males are beautiful

 

[Ah Lee]

Wow the males are beautiful

Yes they are! If they even got half as big as the females they would be seriously stunning lil things. But probably also the first thing to be attacked by a bird.

 

[Ah Lee]

Coming of age



Coffee has been upgraded to rear cricket legs now, and she's really growing up really nicely. My fruit fly culture is generating 20-30 fruit flies a day, so everyone is getting plenty.

I still cannot tell their sexes apart, at least not without a 100% confidence rate. Right now it's just a gut feel, probably based on the build of their bodies and their size.

Still, it is time to start planning Coffee's next home, and that only means one thing...

Field Trip!

Today SWDC sent the human slave on a business trip to learn more about the Nephilengys malabarensis, and hopefully learn more about them in order to provide a good home for Coffee, as I am thinking of letting her go free-roam as well.

Problem was that Skittles was the only one of her kind that I had seen, even after so many months of hiking in the area I found her. I expanded my search into a nearby hill today, and it took all of 3 hours, but I finally found a colony!



This is the first web we saw, a large, impressive waterfall web, under a tree branch. We found many more later, and they all shared the same location type: A vertical trunk with an overhang. A strong anchor line from the overhang to the trunk marks the boundaries of the web, and the web is built within.



Like Skittles, they build a tube web in a nook on the tree trunk, surrounded by a really messy lattice web structure. It's very hard to get near to them for a good picture, because of the lattice web and because they are really sensitive.



One of the most impressive displays was this tree, with a wavy branch. In every nook, there was a Nephilengys web. Incredible, they really do seem to be picky about web-building sites!

The trip was extremely fruitful, I have a plan in mind on how I can create a suitable corner for Coffee now, and that means she could very possibly be free-roam when she gets older.



We finished the trip with a really pretty Nephila kuhlii, it has orange legs instead of red, and is quite a looker! (Not as much as Pepper, of course.)



A dragonfly magically found it's web into her web. How, I do not know. Wasn't me!

 

[Ah Lee]

FFS!

Ladies annnnnd gentlemen! Welcome to our very first Fruit Fly Showdown, A.K.A FFS!

SWDC's fruit fly factory has been absolutely exploding, and I am getting over 30 fruit flies every extraction. I can extract twice a day and still have plenty left in the culture.

For those of you wondering how I transport flying fruit flies, here's a short video showing how they tend to fly upwards when scared. This makes transferring them from the culture bottle to the test tube reaaaally easy.

I released this huge swarm in, and it was mayhem, but really interesting mayhem! The fruit flies usually take about 5 seconds to escape a web once caught, but most of the slings now are really speedy, and catch the flies about 2-3 seconds after they land.
I also noticed they tend to bite, wrap and attach their food to the web, meaning they are always ready to attack new prey without losing the first.

And now, the results!

First place: Coffee (6 kills)



Shouldn't come as a surprise now. Coffee has the largest web, moves the fastest, and her web just seems more effective. Also she has reached the size where she can grind up exoskeletons now, so she is eating much quicker, and making boluses like a spider should!

2nd place: Latte (5 kills)



Latte's web is right below the feeding hole, so she always gets first dibs on food. But with her smaller size, she needs time to lug her food up the web and store it securely, meaning a lot of escapes. By the 5th one she didn't seem to bother to catch anymore, and just sat there sipping her fruit fly. She will be going to a friend of mine once she's big enough!

3rd place: Macchiato (4 kills)



Macchiato is Latte's downstairs neighbour, and often gets leftovers that tumble down Latte's web. It seems to have built a decent web for itself, and it seems to be mixed up with Coffee's gigantic web, so I have seen it steal food from Coffee at least once, but oh well, Coffee is fat enough.

4th place: Cappuccino (3 kills)



Cappuccino used to be doing very badly, building a tiny web in the open corner where flies couldn't venture and where I couldn't drop cricket legs properly because it's lattice web is in the way. It suspiciously grew in size after the disappearance of it's downstairs neighbour, which I would assume is related. In any case, with it's new size, it has built a decent web and has caught 3 flies. Interestingly it didn't lug the flies back up, but left them on the web. Maybe it's just too small?

5th place: Bean (1 kill)



Bean used to have a healthy amount of leftovers since he stays right below Coffee. Ever since the little tree collapsed, his food source has been cut off, but he has always been doing a decent job catching food by himself with his small web, mostly because flies seem to get stuck around the little corner. I call him a 'he', because he seems to be one of those that eats the most, but grows very little. I am just hazarding a guess he might be male, but it's completely unscientific.

6th place: Espresso (0 kills)

Espresso is the one that really isn't doing very well. He has a really tiny web in the far corner of the tank, and almost always catches nothing. The only plus side is that I can feed him cricket legs, but his growth has been really slow, so again I suspect he's a male. Poor chap didn't get anything today, so I'll probably feed him a leg later. He's holed up near the lid now so I couldn't even get a photo.

That concludes the first FFS for the company. Everyone is absolutely stuffed now, and we'll be having some updates on the CEO and the 3rd batch of babies soon. Till next time!

 

[Ah Lee]

Hello world!



The 3rd batch of slings have mostly molted once, and are starting to lose their yolk. I almost forgot how tiny they are, my morning eye booger is larger than them.

Looking back I'm surprised I even managed to raise them!

 

[Ah Lee]

End of SWDC's first internship program



Today Coffee came out to hunt, and I finally got a shot of her in all her tiny majesty. She far outsizes everyone else, and is starting to develop adult colors, sans the bright red markings Mom has. You can see why it is so hard to take a photo of her now. Her lattice web is quite thick, and she spends most of her time in the corner.

It seems that at this age they start to be really wary of predation, and will all run and hide at the slightest bump. A few weeks back there could be an earthquake and they wouldn't flinch.

I am 80% convinced that the size difference between the slings is sexual dimorphism now, and not just feeding amounts. At least for Coffee, she is as big as many mature males now.

Moving on.

The plan to release the rest might be cancelled for now. They seem to thrive well in my care, and I still want to see when the males start exhibiting male characteristics. But for Coffee, she is about to be promoted to have her own office.

I have planned a pretty nice space for her, which I hope she will take up. But that's for the next post!

 

[Ah Lee]

Operation Coffee House is a success!

It's a great day today at SWDC! Armed with a rough idea of what a Nephilengys habitat would look like, I went off to my local aquarium to look through their reject pile of wood. I found one that is the perfect size, with a decent overhang, and lots of nooks and crannies to make Coffee feel secure.

I brought it home, boiled it, cleared some insects out and drilled a hole in it's "armpit". This allows Coffee a secure place to hide, and with any luck she'll find this spot perfect for webbing.



The wood is secured to my cabinet with screws, and I got a grass patch, sign and door from the dollar store just for kicks.



I released Coffee at the bottom, and she seemed to take to the wood right away. She did a bit of exploring, found a small spot she liked, and hid there.



Later on she found the hole I drilled, and really liked it. She spent the rest of the day there, and at night she started fixing a couple of her lattice web there. At that point, I knew i had success! I left her alone, and the next day I was greeted with this.



She had built a massive web, all the way to the corner of the cabinet. For scale, she can comfortably fit inside the 'O' of the word 'coffee'. It is quite impressive! Her web is very hard to photograph, but I did manage to get some shots with a misting bottle as the sun came in.



It looks like there's still room for growth, so hopefully she'll spend the rest of her life here.

I rearranged the table to make space for her and let me mist her without destroying stuff, and I think she really adds to the decor!



The feeling of joy everytime I build a spot that makes a spider want to stay there is indescribable. All that field research has paid off! It's truly a different feeling from keeping one in a cage. I fed her 3 midges from my toilet today, which she very swiftly attacked.

So that's it, Coffee's new office is officially done!

Meanwhile, Skittles has had a fourth eggsac, so she's on maternity leave again. Why am I not even surprised at this point?