| Nursery Web Spider - Pisaurina mira Family Pisauridae - Nursery Web and fishing spiders. Live adult male and female spiders photographed at Georgia and northern Illinois, USA. Insects and Spiders | Spiders Index | Spider Pictures | Jumping Spiders | Beetles Index | Butterflies |
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![]() A very pregnant Pisaurina Mira |
The nursery web spider carries her egg-sac, or coccoon, under her body until near hatching. She then spins a protective web in which her hatchlings live until their first moult.
These spiders resemble the wolf spiders (Lycosidae), but have a different eye pattern. Pisaurids have their eyes arranged in 2 rows, the posterior row slightly recurved, the median eyes in the second row slighly (if any) larger than the others. (Wolf spiders have eyes arranged in 3 rows). The egg sac is carried by the female under her prosoma, held there by her chelicerae and pedipalps. It is further supported by silk lines to the spinnerets. [1] Before the eggs hatch, the female attaches the sac to a plant and then builds a web around it. When the eggs inside are hatching, the momma spider opens the cocoon and releases the hatchlings -- then stands guard nearby. The hatchlings remain in the web until thier first moult. The Pisaurids forage for their food and build webs only for protecting their young. |

The Pisaurid spiders have a distinctive eye arrangement. This egg sac is
about 10mm diameter.

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Some spiders in this family, particularly fishing spiders in the genus Dolomedes, are quite large and may have a legspread of 75 mm or more. The Dolomedes spiders live near water; they walk on the surface of water and dive underneath it to feed on aquatic insects and even small fish. Fishing spiders also carry their egg-sac under their abdomen. |

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