Saturday, March 14, 2009

Ant-Like Spider Species

I recently found another good place for hunting in my school: The garden at the front itself. It is a rather small garden, about as big as a living room in a house, but has a variety of plants. I was wandering around the garden while waiting for my CCA to start. As I walked I looked closely at the Lime Plant and noticed an 'Ant'. But upon taking a closer look I realized that it was not an ant but an Ant-Mimic Spider! I moved my camera in to take a close shot of it.
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It was originally resting but my oft flash seemed to have disturbed it, and hence it moved a little in its tiny silk-weaven web.
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Soon after photographing the spider, I looked under almost every single leaf of the Lime Plant. While I was searching, I came across two individuals together hiding under a leaf. One was under its thick silk web and the oher was outside, waiting to do some services. Well at least thats what I think. I had to try many times to get a clear shot of them as it was rather shaky, there was heavy wind at the time.
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After taking my first shot I realized that there was something else in the web. It could be another spider of the same kind, or a prey that they had caught. Look carefully and you should be able to notice the dark creature inside.
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Soon I managed to find a few more of these Ant-Like Spiders on the very Lime Plant itself. But as I was about to leave, I spotted another spider, this particular one also looking very similar to an ant. But it did not belong to the smae species as that of the previous ones I encountered, as it looked much different and had different colours. Luckily I did manages to get a few shots of it.
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This individual was the only one of the kind that I spotted. I really admired this creature as to how similar it is to ants in appearance. After observing it for quite a while, I noticed that it had something in its mouth. It had caught a small fly or mosquito. I wanted to get a clearer shot so I tried shooting it again. It nearly fleed but I still managed to shoot it.
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It was an awesome experience. Later after telling my seniours about these sightings, I brought them to the gaden and showed them some of the common ones. But I could not find the other species no matter how long I stayed and searched. But I've got photographs, thats good enough for evidence!

4 comments:

Shirls said...

I must come to your school to photograph the ant-spider.

Shawn said...

Haha...
Yeah maybe you could by saying you are a visitor... But I don't really know if there are any left. These photographs are about a few months old...
Well just check the leaves on your own plants and you may find one.

Shirls said...

I know of a prof who is looking for the ant-like spider. He's gone to Johore to look for them. Your find will thrill the researcher for sure.

Shawn said...

Oh! I'll just be too happy to help! Well, its the March Holidays now and hence I need to wait until the start of the next week to check if there are any. Let's hope that I find at least a few...

So are you sure he's gonna come to my school to find them?

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