Green Lynx Spider Peucetia viridans. Arachnid. Photograph taken by the author. Copyright © 2025 Now I Wonder. All rights reserved.

Complete Guide To The Green Lynx Spider

ByChristine Species Guides

Green Lynx Spider

Green Lynx Spider Images

How To Identify Green Lynx spiders

  • Green Lynx Spiders can change colors to match background vegetation.
    • During the summer, their cephalothoraxes and abdomens are bright, leaf-green.
    • During the late summer and early autumn, their bodies change to pale red-brown.
  • Green Lynxes have:
    • Long, semi-translucent legs covered in widely-spaced sharp black spines.
      • Legs are pale in color and can be green, yellow or white but are always spiny.
      • Three claws on each tarsus (the arachnid equivalent of a foot).
    • Tapered abdomens marked with several pale chevrons.
    • Eight eyes arranged in a distinctive pattern:
      • Six eyes form a hexagon shape; two smaller eyes face forward.
  • Unlike the size difference seen between males and females of many other spider species, male and female Green Lynx Spiders are fairly close in size.
    • Female Green Lynx Spiders grow to 0.6 inches (1.6 cm) in total body length.
    • Male Green Lynx Spiders grow to 0.5 inches (1.3 cm) in total body length.

Green Lynx Spider Notes

  • Green Lynx Spiders are powerful predators that attack prey much larger than themselves successfully including potentially dangerous prey such as:
    • Wasps
    • Bees
    • Grasshoppers
    • Dragonflies
  • Green Lynx Spiders are ambush predators that rely on camouflage, surprise rush attacks, and highly accurate, targeted bites to capture prey.
    • They do not spin capture webs like the orbweaver spiders.
    • Green Lynx Spiders wait motionless on tall grass and flowers, concealed in part by matching their body coloration to the plant upon which they rest. They balance on their hind legs, with their front legs raised—a posture reminiscent of praying mantises (Milne and Milne 1980).
    • When prey approaches, Green Lynx Spiders leap upon them and bite the backs of the insects’ heads at the base of their nerve ganglia (Gaddy 2009). This immobilizes the prey. The spiders can feed without risk of injury from the prey fighting back.
  • Look for Green Lynx Spiders in fields with tall grasses and wildflowers.
    • Green Lynx Spiders are well camouflaged. One way to spot them is to look for immobile insects, especially those resting on or dangling from flower heads or seed pods.
  • Juveniles overwinter in North Carolina and mature into adults in early summer.
  • Green Lynx Spiders are extremely beneficial to human agriculture.

Green Lynx Spider Classification

Phylum

Arthropoda

Class

Arachnida

Order

Araneae

Family

Oxyopidae (Lynx spiders)

Genus

Peucetia

Species

P. viridans

Binomial Name

Peucetia viridans

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Christine
Christine is the creator and author of NowIWonder.com, a website dedicated to the animals and plants that share our world, and the science that helps us understand them. Inspired by lifelong exploration and learning, Christine loves to share her knowledge with others who want to connect with wild faces and wild spaces.
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