WE ARE BEING HELD HOSTAGE

Note: Should you suffer from arachnophobia, read no further.

Relax, this is not a terrorist situation. Well, depending on your perception, it is a situation which can indeed strike terror into even the stoutest of hearts. I discovered the trap late on Sunday afternoon when I walked down the garden path to open the gate: my head and face became swathed in something sticky … so sticky that whatever it was brushed off with some difficulty. As it must have been a spider web, I crouched low to avoid it on my return journey – walking in the crouched position far longer than required I might add – then stood up to see what I had just missed.

Even in the glow of the almost setting sunlight I could see the unmistakeable golden strands running in all directions right across the garden path. Thankfully I am too short to have walked into the actual spider which stood guard plonk in the middle:

This is a member of the golden orb spider family known as Trichonephila fenestrata or more commonly as the Hairy Golden Orb-weaver. I cannot help noticing that from this angle its markings look like a face complete with teeth. It is this spider that is keeping us hostage for the time being – how can we expect visitors to come up the garden path only to walk into this large, very strong and rather sticky web and even come face to face with the spider? Happily we have a back entrance that we will use until such time the spider decides it is time to go. One look at its long dark brown or black legs with hairy brushes and I feel sure you would do the same.

The web not only stretches right across the garden path, but seems to have multiple supporting lines that provide considerable depth to the web. These threads take on a beautiful golden colour in the sunlight. While I was photographing it this afternoon, an unsuspecting bee flew into the web. The spider was off in a second, ready to deal with its prey.

Here it appears to be puncturing the bee. This would be to paralyse it prior to wrapping it up in silk to consume later.

It is difficult to see in the light, but I think the spider may be wrapping up its prey here.

The smaller spider in the image below appeared as I was about to leave. I cannot help wondering if this is the male – they are much smaller than the females and generally have to approach the female with great care or they might end up as a meal!

By looking back in my journals, I note that we have hosted a number of golden orb spiders in our garden over the years – usually in March. One took over a large portion of my wash line; another set up home just outside our kitchen door – that one even caused a pair of burly, bullet-proof vested security guards to shiver in their combat boots when they came to check why our burglar alarm had gone off. Mostly the webs have been spun fairly high up and out of the way.