Wild Facts About The Canopy Jumping Spider
The Canopy Jumping Spider looks charming at first glance, thanks to this species’ curving black “eyelashes”, very large, wide, black anterior median eyes, and fuzz-covered body.
But make no mistake. This species of spider is just as much a carnivore and predator as every other spider. And it’s not above scavenging dead bodies when it pleases, either.
It just happens to have some physical characteristics that we humans tend to interpret automatically as “cute”.
Read on to discover the Canopy Jumping Spider.
How To Identify A Canopy Jumping Spider
- Canopy Jumping Spiders are sexually dimorphic but share some characteristics in common.
- Both males and females have:
- Large, black anterior median eyes
- Metallic green chelicerae
- Two pairs of hair tufts on the cephalothorax next to the anterior lateral eyes that resemble eyelashes.
- One pair of tufts sticks straight up
- The second pair sticks out to the side
- Both males and females have:
- Female Canopy Jumping Spiders:
- Grow to 0.7 inches (1.7 cm) in total body length.
- Cephalothorax:
- Is black and covered in pale cream hairs.
- Has a thin black band between the eyes.
- Bears a black clypeus (the area between the anterior eyes and the chelicerae), so looks like the spider has a mustache.
- Abdomen:
- Complex pattern of brown, tan, and cream
- Legs are dark brown and covered with dense, short cream hairs.
- Male Canopy Jumping Spiders:
- Grow to 0.6 inches (1.4 cm) in total body length.
- Cephalothorax:
- Black overall but has a cream band around the back edge.
- Abdomen:
- Mostly black with paired white spots and a tan band that curves around the front of the abdomen
- Legs are black with fine, white hairs.
Canopy Jumping Spider Notes
- Canopy Jumping Spiders are arboreal. They live in the tree canopy of hardwood and coniferous forests, as well as in shrubs and bushes.
- These spiders live in the southern and central United States.
- The northern-most portion of their range cuts a curve through Arizona, Colorado, Nebraska, and through to Ohio and Pennsylvania.
- Like all spiders, Canopy Jumping Spiders are powerful predators for their small size.
- They actively hunt insects in the complex, three-dimensional world of vegetation.
- After anchoring themselves with a line of fine silk, Jumping Spiders attack by leaping onto their prey from a distance and driving their venomous fangs into the preys’ bodies.
- But these spiders also apparently scavenge when the opportunity arises to do so, or when starved.
- A remarkable image was posted to inaturalist.org by Rowan Martin that shows a Canopy Jumping Spider feeding on an adult Hemidactylus turcicus gecko.
- Given that the gecko is huge compared to the spider, it is believed that the spider is scavenging the already dead gecko.
- To see this fantastic image, click here: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/260640960
Canopy Jumping Spider Classification
- The Canopy Jumping Spider gets its informal, English, common name from its preferred habitat, which is in the canopy of trees.
- This species is also known as the “Lazy Jumping Spider”, as its specific epithet (i.e. the species designation “otiosus“) means “idle” in Latin (Gaddy 2009).
|
Phylum |
Arthropoda |
|
Class |
Arachnida |
|
Order |
Araneae |
|
Family |
Salticidae |
|
Genus |
Phidippus |
|
Species |
P. otiosus |
Binomial Name |
Phidippus otiosus |
