Striders and Spiders in and around the Pond

A few years after the pond was put in, I began to see water striders skating here and there looking for prey. Dr. Dan Skean tells me that they are brought in on birds' feet when the birds come down to drink/splash. Here is one I netted so you could see it better. Striders are equipped with a sharp proboscis that they use to make a slurpy out of any floating water creature they find. Last here is a fishing spider that I found on my back door last summer (2015).



This long-jawed (also long-front-legged and long-abdomened) orbweaver had made a permanent hideout in a purple aster bush on the far side of the pond. One night we saw it scooting down a long zip-line to the near edge of the pond, supposedly looking for prey. She also had made an orb just above the water from which to fish for prey. There are many species of the long-jawed orbweaver. Here's a beautiful green one that only showed up in the winters of 2016 and 2017. I had thought it had died out last summer but in my new spider book it is said to make its web in the low branches of a conifer (probably the old blue spruce which hangs over the place I saw the spider.) And I have never got on a ladder to search for it in the summer!



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