Wrap-around spider dorsal detail

A female Dolophones wrap-around spider was seen by chance recently in an urban setting. These spiders are masters of camouflage in a natural setting so in this context she was easier to see....but she did not make my task of documenting her easy as her resting place was in a really inaccessible and hard to get to place!

I hope I captured enough of her amazing dorsal detail for others to appreciate. Even better detail when enlarged. Amazing little spiders.

Dolophones is a genus of spider found primarily here in Australia and Oceania. There are 17 known and named species.

10 mm abdomen diameter

comments (5)

Christine Young

Lion

Her pattern is so beautiful! Posted 10 days ago

Ferdy Christant

Lion

"I hope I captured enough of her amazing dorsal detail for others to appreciate"

You most certainly did! Can't say I've ever seen such a sea of eyes, mind blowing! Posted 10 days ago
1. Ruth Spigelman
  
  Lion
  
  That's fantastic - you have no idea how hard it was to take this picture! It's a rule of mine to not disturb creatures, but I admit to a gentle tap with a long, thin twig in an attempt to encourage her to come out - of course all this did was make her hunker down even more and move higher up and away from the lens...duh. I've probably passed over many of these when I've had my head in the bushes - in their natural setting, so tightly pressed up against their resting twig and those markings are the best camo I've seen in a spider. Posted 10 days ago
2. 1. Ferdy Christant
    
    Lion
    
    What you describe is pretty much my macro anxiety...all the incredible species I walk by, completely missing them.
    
    And not just arthropods, lots of other stuff too. In Colombia we once were in a viper hotspot. We found none. A team of scientist spent 5 full days in the same site, hoping to research them. They found none. I imagine we walked past dozens, even hundreds, completely unaware, yet them aware of us :)
    
    It's part of the fun though, all we can do is try. Posted 10 days ago

Patomarazul

Lion

Is beautiful! Posted 10 days ago

No species identified

The species on this photo is not identified yet. When signed in, you can identify species on photos that you uploaded. If you have earned the social image editing capability, you can also identify species on photos uploaded by others.