Itsy, Bitsy Spider~

Bella saw this arachnid on the railing in our front yard last week and Steve took these pictures of it.  I thought they were really good.  


Thanks to the internet, we were able to identify it as Phidippus audax, a common North American jumping spider.  Audax is Latin for daring or audacious and this spider is sometimes called the Daring Jumping Spider or the Bold Jumping Spider. 

Why, no, I don't mind if you take my picture~

Can I get a copy of these~

Does this angle make my butt look big~

And there you have it...a little nature science and foreign language...can you tell we homeschool?


Oh, and this is funny.  Bella asked me how I would have identified it when I was a little girl since we didn't have internet way back then...thanks honey :)  I had to confess that I probably never would have...considering that even if I had taken a picture of the spider, it would have been on a film camera and I would have had to wait to finish the roll and then get it developed and then take the picture to the library because I don't recall having spider identifying books lying around my house.  Now, a simple google search and we easily had our spider.


Have a great day!


Rach