05/26/2024
Say hello to Mecaphesa Celer, aka the Swift Crab Spider.
This one is a female on my elderberry tree, and she's caught a small bee of some sort!
M. Celer is part of Family Thomisidae, and these little spiders are a valuable ally to farmers everywhere, protecting crops like sorghum, alfalfa, and cotton.
She is an Araneomorph, or "True Spider". True Spiders are characterized by fangs (chelicerae) that oppose one another and by having only two lungs, as opposed to Mygalomorphs (tarantulas, trap door spiders, etc) which have four lungs and parallel, downward facing chelicerae.
M. Celer is an ambush predator and hides in the flowers or upper parts of a plant, camouflaging herself with her surroundings. Females can even change color!
Fun fact, Mecaphesa does NOT use webs for hunting, or build a web at all. In fact, the only time she uses her web is when mating and spinning her egg sac! Instead, she uses her extra long front legs to grasp and hold onto prey while she eats them!
