I know, I know… it’s been too long since the last SPIDERDAY post! The end of term proved busy, but I’m trying to get back on track. So: here are some of the best arachnid-themed stories of the past couple of months. I hope you enjoy all the eight-legged greatness! Let’s start things off with a beautiful photo:

• The photo, above, is in this great post about “wolf-like” prowling spiders. It’s my read of the month.
• Ballooning spiders and deep evolutionary branches
• Unusual oral sexual encounters with Darwin’s Bark spiders.
• Yay for peacock spiders! They help the media produce some positive stories about spiders.
• Unfortunately, stories like this don’t help: SPIDERS ON A PLANE!!!
• The Excavator Spider.
• From Tasmania… Flooding rivers affect spiders: the evidence is all the silk from their ballooning.
• On the importance of vision for the net-casting spider.
• Ridiculously long spiders. That is all.
• A lovely video about the amazing arachnologist, Norman Platnick.
• Fascinating: how Tarantula venom might eventually help those who suffer from IBS.
• Incredible product from spiders: How spider silk stays tense.
• Just check out this amazing jumping spider art (here’s the Etsy shop):

• Truly amazing Mites. More folks should study these arachnids.
• Mite-look-a-likes: new species of Mite Harvestmenpersons from Australia
• For the scorpion enthusiasts: new species from California.
• What a great resource for the UK: illustrated key to British pseudoscorpions.
• A great resource for Arachnophiles from western Canada.
• The awesomeness of huntsman spiders.
• Citizen science, spider style: Prince Edward Island is the winner
• Venomous (southern) spiders hiding in a (northern) museum.
• Snake pretends to be a spider, to catch a prey. Wow.
• A Festschrift for Robert R Jackson. Great looking suite of papers.
• Neat looking paper: how leaf-dwelling jumping spiders find their microhabitat (using visual cues)
• Jumping spiders, getting flirty. Here’s the video: