#arachnidabilities

[sixteenseveredhands]

Strange Bedfellows: these unprecedented photos show a leafcutter bee sharing its nest with a wolfspider

I stumbled across these photos while I was looking up information on leafcutter bees, and I just thought that this was too cool not to share. Captured by an amateur photographer named Laurence Sanders, the photos were taken in Queensland, Australia several years ago, and they quickly garnered the attention of both entomologists and arachnologists.

The leafcutter bee (Megachile macularis) can be seen fetching freshly-cut leaves, which she uses to line the inner walls of her nest. The wolfspider moves aside as the bee approaches, allowing her to enter the nest, and then she simply watches as the leaf is positioned along the inner wall.

Once the leaf is in position, they seem to inspect the nest together, sitting side-by-side in the entryway; the bee eventually flies off again to gather more leaves, while the wolfspider climbs back into the burrow.

The leafcutter bee seems completely at ease in the presence of the wolfspider, which is normally a voracious predator, and the wolfspider is equally unfazed by the fact that it shares its burrow with an enormous bee.

The photographer encountered this bizarre scene by accident, and he then captured a series of images over the course of about 2 days (these are just a few of the photos that were taken). During that 2-day period, the bee was seen entering the nest with pieces of foliage dozens of times, gradually constructing the walls and brood chambers of its nest, and the spider was clearly occupying the same burrow, but they did not exhibit any signs of aggression toward one another.

The photos have been examined by various entomologists and arachnologists, and those experts seem ubiquitously surprised by the behavior that the images depict. The curator of entomology at Victoria Museum, Dr. Ken Walker, noted that this may be the very first time that this behavior has ever been documented, while Dr. Robert Raven, an arachnid expert at the Queensland Museum, described it as a "bizarre" situation.

This arrangement is completely unheard of, and the images are a fascinating sight to behold.

Sources & More Info:

Brisbane Times: The Odd Couple: keen eye spies bee and spider bedfellows in 'world-first'

iNaturalist: Megachile macularis

[kedreeva]

She has finalized her decision and chosen the mailbox with her name on it to start making her hammock!

[platypu]

orb weavers' sexual dimorphism is hilarious to me like.

me and my big beautiful wife

[emmaklee]

spider eye arrangements

[fallout-lou-begas]

if tarantulas are so dangerous then how come

?

[crevicedwelling]

a meeting of creatures…

[shamanicganja]

[onenicebugperday]

Velvet lynx spider, Oxyopes flavipalpis, Oxyopidae

This species comes in a pretty wide range of coloration, which you can see here if you’re curious!

Photographed in Zimbabwe by spidermandan

[dragonsheepstudios]

Delight

[herpsandbirds]

Purple Gold Jumping Spider (Irura bidenticulata), males, family Salticidae, found in SE Asia

photographs by Artur Tomaszek Inglourious Reptiles

[ground-muttmeg]

I DID IT. I FINALLY DID IT. THE BUG TAROT DECK IS COMPLETE!!!

🐛🦋🐞🪲🦟🪳🐜🦗🕷️🪰🕸️

y’all this took FIVE MONTHS…… almost a whole half a year…. it felt like it took just forever tbh but now it’s over… and READY TO BE MADE 💗💗💗

unfortunately I am poor and can’t make these without support- BUT if you like supporting queer disabled artists, and getting a cool hand drawn tarot deck out of it (and maybe some cool extras? I’m still working out what those might be!) I am running a Kickstarter project for these launching on September 24th!!

reward tiers include:

- $1-$39 just for support!

- $40 for a Major Arcana only set (22 cards)

- $50 for a Major + Minor Arcana set (full 78 cards)

- $75 for a full 78 card set WITH SILVER GILDED CARD EDGES!!

I also made a short video! it’s a little amateurish but hey it works well enough, and you can see the themes for the minor arcana in it!

link to the kickstarter!! we’ll be launching on the 24th but you can follow it now to be notified!!

[dakeus-art]

I'm having fun making pop ups lately

[yee-qi]

Tribute to Anomalocaris

Not a Perspectives post, still working on the next one of those. Anomalocaris also isn't exactly the great grandpappy of all arthropods, but...close enough lol

[yurifem]

<3

[gthostz]

it is once again

little guy time

[crevicedwelling]

another ant mimic jumping spider from Singapore. this one might have been the most antlike out of any spider I’ve ever seen, with a little crease on its opisthosoma to look like an ant’s segmented abdomen and posterior lateral eyes set to look like an ant’s angular head!

Myrmaplata sp.