Southern Marsh Orchids

Southern Marsh Orchids

Sunday 20 October 2013

Linyphia triangularis

Money spiders are a species-rich and difficult group that I've never tackled seriously, but Linyphia triangularis is one of the few readily identifiable species, being quite large (for a money spider) and having a distinctive tuning fork mark on the carapace.

I found a female on our garden Olive bush today, resting upside down in a horizontal web. Apparently the species is ubiquitous on stiff-leaved bushes, so the Olive is probably an ideal plant for it.

I didn't get a photo but there are some good ones on the Eurospiders website. Mine was a dark specimen very similar to the second one illustrated.

1 comment:

  1. I've never looked at money spiders because Roberts Field Guide only has a handful in. When I went on a spider course in the spring this year, Paul Lee's opinion was that provided you had a reasonable quality stereo microscope, they are no more trouble to id than their bigger cousins. Mind you, I think you would need a bit more than the x60 magnification that mine is capabe of!

    ReplyDelete