A really lovely walk this morning in the tall grass meadows by the lakes and river at Rushden.
on closer inspection I found two intriguing spiders that had used the tops of grasses to make their webs.
If you look carefully the spider in the first photo is busy devouring something .
The spider in the photo above is really clear in profile on closer inspection it’s abdomen is patterned black and white.
Looking in my new book I had for Christmas my best idea is a member of the Theridiidae because of the colouring maybe Dipoena melanigaster very hard to identify without hand lens.
The next spider surprises were amongst the bramble and grasses by the river. These were funnel like tubes with spider sitting at the entrance and dashing back in as soon as I approached. These are labyrinth spiders. Agelena labyrinthicaThey come out of their funnel and drag prey down into the tube, they have a similar mating behaviour grabbing the mate and dragging them into the tube.Some of them have almost trip wires to know when the prey in near the web area ready to be grabbed .
These spiders dart back in at the slightest movement or even shadow , they sit at the tube entrance but dart away at the slightest thing especially me with a phone camera !
NATURE TABLE EXPLORER 