Remember this gal?

Remember this gal?

She is a “writing spider” aka Argiope aurantia

When I originally posted the picture in Little things of note, another smaller Argiope aurantia had built a smaller web nearby in the same plant. I didn’t think much of it since I had seen 5 or 6 others in the beds closest to the house.

Well, it turns out the smaller one was a male; once at sexual maturity, males leave their webs and go wandering in search of females. Once they find one, it is common for them to throw together a small web nearby before they “make their move”. They eventually get the attention of the female by loitering at the edge of her web, tapping to try and get noticed, waiting until she is receptive (or whatever the term is for when spiders get in the mood).

If successful, the female will lay between 300 and 1200 eggs in a protective egg sack that is literally left hanging for the winter.

So what becomes of the smaller male after fulfilling his biological duty for the season? Maybe the expectant female somehow knows there is no way she can get enough child support out of the deadbeat to cover 300, 500, 1000 or more children…….

So she just eats him: