tobiasbauer's Favorites

Collected from leaf litter while sweeping my driveway.

~14mm adult female

Still figuring out lighting, etc. Dark features are difficult to image nicely.

Happy to contribute a complete and "proper" observation :)

Hand-collected from a rock wall

Long, coiled embolus seems to be distinctive and probably sufficient for IDs with clear enough macro photos. The "front" angle was intended to show this feature without a microscope.

San Marcos River frontage

Caldwell County, Texas

Tentative determination based on my examination of this preserved specimen, kindly sent to me by @sherrylikesspiders - A state record for Texas.

Several observations have been made on the same residential property in East Texas going back at least 2 years, so there is clearly an established population. More hunting/collection would need to be done to see how widely it is found in this area. As large wandering spiders, presumably the population is not isolated to this property.

~15mm adult female, external shape of epigynum matches nicely with Ctenus captiosus as described and drawn by Peck (1981), particularly the recurved lateral "spurs" toward the posterior half of the epigynum. This specimen generally agrees with other somatic characters in Peck's description, and the venter of the abdomen in life compares well with the few ventral images of C. captiosus on BugGuide. Light recumbent hairs in cephalic area. The size is a bit smaller than Peck's data which lists 17.89 +/- 2.27

Again this is a tentative identification - since there are no Ctenus species previously known from this part of Texas, this could possibly be a similar species introduced from Mexico or Central/South America. Examination of an adult male specimen would also add confidence to this determination.

Note: Most of the Mexican Ctenus species have not been reviewed since their original descriptions over 100 years ago, and the drawings/descriptions may not be sufficient for a confident ID in any event, but I did not find any matches there.

I will hang onto this specimen for a short while before sending it to Allen Dean to examine and deposit in the TAMUIC. I've also removed a leg for barcoding - hopefully the material has not degraded and can produce a good sequence.

Thanks to @sherrylikesspiders for collecting and sending this specimen!

NB: Observation date/time/locality reflects info provided by collector

What is this spider?
It has 4 white/transparent legs at the backside and 4 black legs on the front side.
The reason it has only 2 black legs is because it seems it has lost the other two front legs.
And it's body is a very strange shape, looks like its cut off in the middle but it's not.
At first, I thought it's not a spider, but then it started to release a bit of his web.
Found it on my grapes.