![]() Their feeding strategy is a cunning combination of ambush and camouflage. Unlike many spiders, they don’t spin webs to trap insects. Females are most often encountered feeding on bumblebees, honeybees, butterflies, moths, hoverflies, and whatever other juicy flower visitors arrive, whereas males have a busier life climbing up and down flowers looking for mates, and eating the occasional insect and piece of pollen to fuel their quest. ![]() Seen between May and August, it is the most common flower spider and the females are larger and more often seen than the males. The crab spider ( Misumena vatia) is so-named because its long front legs are arranged in a crab-like fashion, and it can run sideways. I thought it was odd that they would all die naturally in the same spot, so I looked on the flowerheads and soon spotted the culprit (cue sharp intake of breath). I encountered the particular species that I am going to write about when I was dead-heading my scabious plant in the garden and noticed a pile of dead bumblebees beneath the plant. Truly, though, our native UK spiders are relatively benign. However, I myself am nursing a split lip as I write, because I walked headfirst into an orb spider web in the garden and hit myself in the face with a trowel when I panicked. They say spiders in the UK are not a threat. ![]() Lots of us are arachnophobes, and we have evolved to be for good reason because, in many parts of the world, spider bites have caused human illness and death. ![]()
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