Keeping spiders

[McCruiskeen]

A female Araneus diadematus insisted upon building her web between my two wheelie bins, with the result that it was destroyed each week at bin collection time. I caught her and put her on the Tamarind tree that I have growing on my study windowsill and she has happily constructed a web in it. I keep her supplied with flies, one per day, which she gratefully guzzles. I have examined the hoverfly carcasses she has left, with my stereo microscope and they are absolutely sucked-dry, dessicated husks.
I kept a similar spider on the tree last year, but I have always wanted to rear some Argiope bruennichi spiders, in a greenhouse with suitable growing foliage. Where could I (legally) get hold of eggs, spiderlings or adults?

[McCruiskeen]

The ungrateful wretch (I had called her Diedre) ate her web during the night and disappeared. She's certainly well fed, having consumed one hoverfly, one dungfly, five houseflies and a bluebottle (not forgetting her web) in the space of a week. I wonder if she has gone off somewhere quiet to moult? My Tamarind tree just doesn't look the same without her sitting there in the middle of her web.

[Action_Man]

You should have left it where it was .

I have a Steatoda bipunctata on my wheelie bin, its been there for several weeks, she goes out when the bin goes out, and she always comes back ...

[McCruiskeen]

I had considered leaving Diedre where she was on the wheelie bin, but thought that building a new web on a weekly basis might be somewhat draining on her protein resources. The tamarind tree on my study windowsill seemed to provide an ideal location, having just the sort of branch and foliage structure to suit Araneus diadematus. She captured and fed, voraciously and kept her web in good order. Maybe it was something I said!

[Action_Man]

Well you may be surprised to find out that, Araneus diadematus rebuild there web every evening as a matter of course ...

[McCruiskeen]

One wonders why such an energy-wasteful behaviour would evolve, and under what environmental constraints? I understood that Araneus diadematus would eat the silk of an old web that had been destroyed and then build a new one. I also understood that this species exhibited web-repairing behaviours. Maybe I have read insufficient research papers.

[Venger]

Hardly energy wasteful its recycling the protein from the old web. The glue tends to dry out over the day so it's quicker to eat it and start again to maintain its usefulness.

[McCruiskeen]

Diedre has re-appeared! I found her this morning, in the centre of a web she had constructed between the right angle formed by the plastic curtain rail and the vertical edge of the curtain. I have captured her and put her back in the tamarind tree where she is currently lying against the trunk, "playing dead!" Oh, frabjous day! Bring hither the fatted calf etc. etc.

[McCruiskeen]

[quote=McCruiskeen;66215 Oh, frabjous day! Bring hither the fatted calf etc. etc.[/QUOTE] Or perhaps the fatted bluebottle!

[McCruiskeen]

"Diedre" is actually Donald. (I thought those pedipalps were rather long!) and I found his moulted skin on the windowsill. he is now occupying the corner of the UPVC window frame, having eschewed the offer of my tamarind tree. I shall catch him and place him in the bramble bushes in the dene at the end of my street, where there are many Araneus diadematus females sitting in webs. It would be a shame if a well-fed, newly moulted male like Donald were eaten by some hungry female. Way to go, Donald!

I must get to Specsavers!