We have a couple of terraria with Bold Jumping spiders — they’re fairly large, they got big cute eyes, they’re usually active — but the biggest of our jumpers retired to a silken refugium last month. We decided to check on her and winkle her out, and discovered the sad truth.
She was dead.
She did, however, leave a legacy — a big egg sac full of squirmy baby bold jumpers. Take a look!
Cute brood. They have their mother’s eyes.
I’m getting used to the spider pics and information but they still give me the creeps. But they’re so interesting!!! 🤷🏾♀️
Ah….that reminds me of “Charlotte’s Web.”
I’ve seen a few of your adult spiders just turn up dead. The Bold Jumping spiders supposedly can live for two years in captivity. Any idea what kinds of things they succumb to, though I’m sure you’ll never know with this one? Just curious what sorts of things usually kill them (like viruses?). I get with animals that small they’re usually either alive and perfectly fine or dead- not a lot in between. That’s why my career as a a spider veterinarian didn’t pan out.
Since the spider was locked tight in the container, does it need, and have, outside air? How long can it go without?
“Bold?! Well, hell yes it’s BOLD!”
https://youtu.be/M2Fm7Dkc5Ag
Adorable spiderlings!
So it is this species :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phidippus_audax
but less bold variants in colouration and bright patches then? The ‘audax” part of their name referring to eagles, I think, yeah?
Do these spiders show a lot of variation locally and by family here?
The Pointer Sisters – Jump
https://youtu.be/uyTVyCp7xrw
Years ago I had done the same thing with a bold jumper egg sac. The babies had only recently hatched, and at that time they were pale and basically immobile, unlike your little bebbies. As I understand it, hatchlings will molt (I guess to the 2nd instar) while still in the egg sac, and then they become more mobile. One wonders about the neurological changes from hatchling immobility to 2nd instar mobility.
I don’t know if you’re serious about adopting, but I’d happily volunteer – no idea how I’d come to collect them though, nor how quickly I could get an enclosure set up.
I’m guessing these guys probably wouldn’t survive getting sent thru the mail, but hey, maybe next time you have an egg sac you don’t need…