Black Widow Hatchlings

[BillTyler]

A friend found a really gigantic black widow, captured it, put it in a jar, and let me know he had a photo subject. A few days later, the spider laid a huge mass of eggs into a silk egg case. After that, she was considerably smaller. A few weeks later, the babies hatched. We took the jar outside one evening, shined a spotlight on the jar from one side, and opened the top. The babies soon started to emerge, to spin silk bridges, and to generally disperse into the woods. This image shows three of the hatchlings, each about 1/8 inch across, on their newly spun web.

Canon 5Dmk3
Canon MP-E 65mm f/2.8 macro lens. Magnification not recorded, but between 3x and 5x.
1/200, f/16, ISO 800

Bill

[Jonathan Ashton]

Good job on a difficult subject the closer you go the harder it is to focus on one let alone three!! If the occasion were to recur I would suggest a little less magnification to offer a little more DOF.

[Mitch Haimov]

You captured a great moment.

[BillTyler]

Thanks. I would have liked more DOF. While I was photographing was going on, the spiderlings were very active. Some hatchlings seemed content to stay in the jar. Others were quite active in leaving, and when I was done, I found baby spiders in all sorts of places, including my arms. At this size, they seem uninterested in biting people, and i fact their fangs may not be long enough to penetrate human skin. We had thought that putting the jar in the middle of a large pan of water would constrain the babies to the neighborhood of the jar. But they easily bridged the gap to the edge of the pan with silk strands. It's pretty clear that they have a lot of very effective strategies to travel away from the location where they hatch. In the meantime, mama black widow stayed put in the jar, guarding a second egg case.

[Allen Sparks]

Bill, an interesting image and story to go along with it. It would have been incredibly tough to get all three hatchlings super shot so I think you did well with this. - Allen

[LinzRiverBalmer]

very interesting and more power to you for having the guts to shoot and not run.

I quite like black widows, they don't really frighten me as their webs are so distinct the second you touch one its like an electric zap.

The babies do in fact actually have more venom than Mom, as do the males who are also smaller.......... as you said though, their fangs are too short to impart much harm, though I have gotten minor reactions.

Here in NM most people that deal with going under houses are immune to the bites of the moms.

I will take a black widow over a brown recluse any day.

My yard is over run with widows the past two years and I've done away with quite a few as they were in places dangerous to myself or animals, in the gardens I leave them alone unless they are choking out plants.

This shot is very well done for how small they are and the conditions you were in.