Tuesday, September 10, 2024

The female yellow garden spiders in our meadow and flower gardens have each spun their final web and left behind a small brown paper sac of eggs. Each sac hangs by a series of thin threads. (Can a spider egg sac be cute? I think so.) I usually find a sac tucked among a cluster of tall goldenrod stems or other flowers. But not always. This year, one spider built her nest between a fence post and the electric fence charger. Very exposed to predators, weather, and the accidental whisking away by a human. Oops.

Yellow garden spider egg sac

Yellow garden spider egg sacI’ve not opened a sac to estimate the number of eggs. The literature says it could be hundreds or a thousand or more. We are in the climate zone where the spiderlings will hatch soon and either stay in the sac all winter or venture out this fall. Either way they are so susceptible to nature’s chaos.

I found another sac situated between a short fence and our Swiss chard patch. Again, not such a good place. I removed the rabbit-proof fence the other day. I forgot about the spider sac until I saw it hanging from the fence. I carefully moved it to a safer place, for now, among the chard. I’m hoping the warm weather will encourage the spiderlings to choose the move-out-soon option.

My biggest dilemma is what to do about the sacs in the meadow. We cut down and mow the meadow once a year. This helps keep it in wildflowers of goldenrods, asters, ironweed, Joe-pye weed, boneset, and free of unwanted woody plants. But I have to think about the spiderlings. Just as I move carefully through the meadow when the females have their webs strung across my path, I’ll proceed carefully with the fall cutting of plants. I’ll try to leave an uncut cluster around any sac I find.

Monday, August 26, 2024

Plants (although, not all) are flourishing in our yard with the summer’s rain and humidity. Eggplant and pepper plants are three feet tall and spreading out beyond the raised beds. The crabapple tree is loaded with scarlet-red fruits–40 crabapples make a nice pie, if you like, as I do, things just a bit sour. My cucumbers were a flop, while the tomatoes continue to yield the most precious summer fruits, despite various afflictions that come with a wet, humid summer.

Our small wildflower meadow is lush with wildflowers. Goldenrods that have never been taller, mix with the white flowers of asters and bonesets. Very tall purple-flowered ironweeds tower over all. There are a few weedy plants that I try to minimize by pulling the stems, roots and all, before they set flower. I walk quietly and slowly though the tall growth to avoid disturbing our friends the spiders. And yes, I love spiders. They don’t bite (if left alone), or fly away, or eat our vegetables or berries. They mostly sit completely still, waiting for a meal to fly into their nearly invisible web. 

Around early August is when I typically notice the first yellow garden spider (Argiope aurantia) clinging to her web masterfully spun with a zig-zag pattern (called a “stabilimentum) down the middle. If there is one of these large orb weavers, I know there are more. I try to locate them all so I don’t walk through a web by mistake–this month I found five in the meadow. You can’t miss the striking black and yellow body and eight light-colored legs with black tips.

I’ve not found a male yellow garden spider, perhaps because they are much smaller and die soon after mating. The female eventually builds a brown, paper-like sac filled with eggs. She will die at first frost and the spiderlings will hatch next spring and start the process anew unless they are eaten by another predator, which often happens in nature. 

Yellow garden spider