Showing off our lavely backyard Argiope aurantia. She’s an ornament to our house.

One of the virtues of the heat is that we have lazily allowed our backyard to run wild. Thigh-high grasses, thistles, strange forbs, all kinds of happy weeds are growing everywhere, and with them comes the fierce invertebrates. Welcome home, Argiope aurantia! The queen of our yard has returned, finding a bounty of grasshoppers and other insects thriving in her domain!

Our backyard is fenced off and isolated from the sidewalk and road, so I hope none of the philistines in the city works department are going to complain and order it all cut down. I like my personal backyard jungle.

We got up early this morning to run errands in the exotic metropolis of Alexandria (not the one in Egypt), which mainly involved the process of melting my flesh into the fabric of a car seat. It is unpleasantly hot, but we had things that needed to be done.

Before we left, though, I checked out the spiders around my back door. We have a guardian Parasteatoda in a nice cobweb between the door and the mailbox…she’s a lovely young lady.

Five or six centimeters away, she had a suitor in waiting. He was busily wrapping up a present for her.

Then nearby we found Theridion hanging out in a yarrow flower.

They were turning away from me, so I got a second shot of their pretty face.

Then we scooted off to do our errands. Unfortunately, on our journey, we encountered the Freedom Propaganda Truck.

Yuk. The ass end of that ugly cargo of lies has a big sign that says “Follow me!”, so we turned and went in the opposite direction.

I released this wolf spider onto a rock, and moved to take a picture. I immediately noticed that she was incredibly still and obliging, and got one quick photo before I noticed the problem — that rock was in full sunlight and was hot enough to melt lead, I think. She was in total shock. I immediately flicked her into a nearby patch of dirt, with shade, and she recovered, but another minute and she would have been baked. So this is the only photo you’re going to see of that spider.

She did her little dance when I got a glass of water.

My desk spider, the Parasteatoda I keep in front of me on my desk, made an egg sac!

How is your desk spider doing?

They always look so affectionate.

The Guardian is asking for nominations for the Invertebrate of the Year, and you can submit your choice!

I made a safe and conventional pick.

Parasteatoda tepidariorum

This is not the most glamorous spider — it’s extremely common, found in pretty much every home (although you may not know about them!), and represents a diverse group of invertebrate predators. In the last few decades it has become a useful standard model system in developmental biology. This spider is a workhorse for science!

They’re also pretty. I’ve got one on my computer desk, in a vial, and I occasionally give her a mealworm. She’s a quiet and pleasant pet.

Your date has bright green teeth, and there’s a bug caught in them. What do you do?