in recent weeks i've strayed a bit from the Araneae (true spiders) that i had intended to feature exclusively way back at the inception of webnesday. in fact, embarrassingly, neither of the last two arachnids (whipspiders and harvestmen) can even produce silk, giving lie to the 'webnesday' title. and since reponses to the former ranged from 'coooool' to 'quite terrifying' to 'eight-legged parcel of terror,' i'll even scuttle back into the realm of true spiders with a nice charismatic salticid. there, everybody happy?
this vivid, fuzzy bundle of shoebutton eyes is the endearingly named Mopsus mormon, a large (to 12mm) jumping spider native to eastern australia (pics courtesy of tomboy again). her common names include 'green jumping spider' and (shudder) 'clown spider,' and the species apparently has an 'unusually large and complex' display repertoire for a salticid. being quite active, Mopsus is probably hard to capture well on film (or pixels), although tomboy did a nice job in the above shot. a quick search around the interweb (groan) revealed that several other photographers have also been lucky/persistent with this species, like this one (in particular, this shot). i know i'd love to get the chance, myself!
today's featured eight-legger is an arachnid, but like last week's impostor, it's not a true spider. (back to the Araneae proper next week, i promise!) this is a harvestman, order Opiliones, often called 'daddy longlegs' in the northern hemisphere (not to be confused with the other 'daddy longlegs' or cellar spider, Pholcus phalangioides). a friend of mine spotted it on the bank of the wahine river in the tararua ranges recently.
harvestmen resemble true spiders in having the correct number of legs (eight, like all the cool squids kids), but their two body segments (abdomen and cephalothorax) appear fused into a single oval shape, and they lack venom and silk glands, like whipspiders. most species have two eyes (instead of a spider's eight), one on each side of a small turret-like structure on top of the cephalothorax. there are some pretty cool SEMs here, and a couple of them show the eyes; you can also get a good look at them here.
harvestmen are able to ingest solid food in chunks (unlike spiders) and they have a range of interesting jaws/jaw-like structures. the one in the photo, family Monoscutidae (probably from the genus Megalopsalis or Pantopsalis, endemic to nz/australia - more cool pics here), has greatly enlarged chelicerae in some mature males - see?
crazy. i've never seen a harvestman that looks like this - the ones i'm familiar with have nice discreet, small chelicerae, like this. the function of these huge chompers is unknown, but some speculate that they are used to rip open largeish items for scavenging ('largeish' relative to the harvestman, that is). it seems, however, that bizarre-looking features aren't at all unusual in the Opiliones.
here's another nice pic, probably the same species, borrowed from the rimutaka trust (photo by k. alekna).
anyone recognize this?
chances are fairly high that you've seen one, especially if you're a harry potter fan. in the goblet of fire movie, mad-eye moody demonstrates the unforgivable curses on a 'spider' - actually, one of these, an amblypygid. commonly called 'whipspiders' or 'tailless whipscorpions,' they are in the class Arachnida (along with true spiders, ticks, mites, scorpions, and many others), but they belong to their own order, Amblypygi, instead of the order Araneae (true spiders).
whipspiders differ from true spiders in many ways, including not producing silk or venom, and using the highly modified first pair of legs - see the long filaments above (which would be walking legs in true spiders) - as sensory organs, to search out prey.
whipspiders are found worldwide in the tropics and subtropics, and quite a few people keep them as pets - try searching for 'amblypygid' on the arachnoboards (this one is particularly impressive). there are also some good videos on youtube, like this one (quite informative, nice footage of a wee 10-month old), or, if you really want nightmares, this one.
i saw this one at the henry doorly zoo in omaha.
this is my favorite spot in the waitakere ranges. it's where we would have gotten married if the weather had permitted, but it is no less dear for the prohibitive mud of last october. its boulders, silky waterfalls, icy pools and hidden mossy grottoes need no real description, but i do wish i could capture the chorus of tuis, the whistle of woodpigeons in flight and the constant shush and trickle of the stream as the soundtrack to these images.
in keeping with the waitakeres theme (and more on this to follow shortly), i bring you a beautiful fishing spider, Dolomedes sp., encountered by a colleague of mine who studies frogs out there on a regular basis. you'll be pleased to know that the frogs don't eat spiders, rather selecting arthropods that are lower on the food chain, so this lovely girl with her egg sac should be safe.
'It was a never-to-be-forgotten battle,' said Charlotte. 'There was the fish, caught only by one fin, and its tail wildly thrashing and shining in the sun. There was the web, sagging dangerously under the weight of the fish. ...There was my cousin, slipping in, dodging out, beaten mercilessly over the head by the wildly thrashing fish, dancing in, dancing out, throwing her threads out, fighting hard... '
i can vividly remember the illustration for this story, too, but no one else seems to have thought it worth adding to the treasure trove of images available on google. sad. will have to see if i can find a copy of charlotte's web and add the image later...
in october of 2007 i spent a week in paris visiting museum collections. while i did chronicle some of those
experiences here, i had the best of intentions for others but never got around
to them.
well, i re-read my travel journal the other day and feel the time has come to tell you about the place i stayed during that week. here is what i recorded about my b&b in paris:
'marble floors, carved wooden furniture with gilt accents,
curly brass fixtures and candelabra, frou-frou knickknacks and figurines. the whole nine yards. my room has a very firm, but comfortable,
double bed with a frilly white satin bedspread.
'icing on the cake: the bathroom.
wow, the bathroom. pink fixtures
(tub, sink, toilet, and – i believe? – bidet, plus radiator, vanity and
linens), ornate black tile walls, mirrors in elaborate brass frames (about four
of them, including one over the tub), countless bottles of cosmetics and
lotions. scented pink toilet paper
dispensed in small, individual squares.
interestingly, taps all pretty much require a wrench to turn off
completely, as i discovered when i tried the cold tap on the ?bidet out of
curiosity – just wanted to see what the water actually did in there!
'shower is a true engineering marvel, packing maximum inconvenience into a small area. shower head hangs on a prong at waist level. endlessly perplexing – does one sit under it or hold it while in use? shower-head weighs about 3kg, so holding is tiring; the balancing kneel/crouch option is also not ideal. pressure is so high and holes so tiny that the shower-head is like a water-blaster – tolerable on thickly padded scalp, excruciating on, say, nipples. tried to soften the spray during first shower by turning the taps way down – resulted in sinusoidal temperature fluctuation between pleasant and antarctic, about once a minute. an additional problem of the high-pressure head: the shower curtain is quite flimsy, tending to blow inward and stick clammily to the bather, but also does not reach the edges of the tub, so keeping shower spray contained while in holding-the-head mode requires extreme concentration. finally, a stream of searingly hot water dribbles constantly from the tub spigot exactly where one’s feet are normally positioned. did get the general hang of this by the end of the week, but the first shower (after the 46-hour trip from nz, lest the importance of this shower be overlooked) was pretty much spent frantically hopping around, and required a large number of the helpfully abundant pink towels for post-shower mopping.'
but when the reservoir is full, gentle waves lap over the sides and curtain down the sides of this massive drain. and when rainfall has been particularly heavy, it starts to roar. (i have a video of the roaring that i'm trying to dig out, but for now the stills of the calmer day will have to do.)
i spent most of last week freezing in wellington - i must truly have a flat learning curve, to have gone down there with neither scarf nor umbrella. both were sorely missed. i did manage to see the colossal squid display, finally, and was delighted to discover a current exhibition on monet and the other impressionists (which i missed in college, when it was on at its home, the boston museum of fine arts). i also discovered a sandwich that made me nearly as rapturous as the windfall of german food: reuben sandwich on a jalapeno cheese bagel. hot DAMN. i had to have two of those, plus two additional bagels, over the three days i was in town.
sadly, due to wind/rain/general meteorological misery, wellington itself afforded no decent photos. i did get some nice behind-the-scenes ones at the museum, but it's not the right day for those yet. ;) the flight back on friday, however, presented some very nice vistas indeed.
