Inchordate

A closer look at Crab Spider

While my wife, daughter, and I were taking our afternoon walk around our village, I spotted a flash of blue and black underneath a flowering bush. Looking more closely, I realized they were scattered Butterfly wings. I suddenly remembered that such were usually the remains of the victim of some tiny predator and decided to take an even closer look.

It took a couple of minutes of searching, but sure enough, I soon found a cream-colored Spider, the thorax around the size of a large pea, neatly camouflaged on one of the blooms. It was a Flower Crab Spider, his front legs spread wide open above the head in crablike fashion (thus the name), waiting patiently for his next meal. While we were observing the Spider, a fly landed on a nearby petal. Quicker than my eye could follow, the Spider clamped his forelegs together, trapping the hapless insect. I ran home to grab my cell phone and managed to snap a few photos before the rain came pouring down.