Peucetia viridans
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| Green lynx spider | ||||||||||||||||
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| Peucetia viridans (Hentz, 1832) |
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Sphasus viridans |
The green lynx spider (Peucetia viridans) is a conspicuous, large, bright green spider found on shrubs. It is the largest North American lynx spider.
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[edit] Description
The female reaches a body length of 22mm, the more slender male averages 12mm. There usually is a red patch between the eyes, with red spots over the body. The eye region is clothed with white appressed hairs. The legs are green to yellow, with very long black spines and covered with black spots. It is rather similar to P. longipalpis, the other Peucetia species to occur in the US.
Gravid females are able to change their color to fit their background. This takes about 16 days.[1]
[edit] Habits
The female constructs one to four 2cm egg sacs in September and October of 25 to 600 bright orange eggs each, which is guarded. She usually hangs upside down from the sac and attacks everything that comes near. The eggs hatch after about two weeks. Then it takes another two weeks until fully functional spiderlings emerge. They need eight instars to reach maturity
[edit] Human interest
It very seldom bites humans, and its bite is harmless.[2] This spider is primarily of interest for its use in agricultural pest management, for example in cotton fields. They have been observed to hunt several moth species, including some of the most important crop pests, for example the bollworm moth Heliothis zea, the cotton leafworm moth Alabama agrillacea and cabbage looper moth Trichoplusia ni. and their larvae. However, they also prey on beneficial insects, for example honey bees.
[edit] Distribution
This species occurs in the southern United States, Central America, the West Indies and Venezuela.
[edit] Name
The species name is derived from viridis "green".
It is not to be confused with P. viridana, a species that only occurs in India and Myanmar, or P. viridis from Spain and Africa.
[edit] Footnotes
- ^ Oxford GS, Gillespie RG (1998). "Evolution and ecology of spider coloration". Annu. Rev. Entomol. 43: 619–43. doi:. PMID 15012400.
- ^ Bush SP, Giem P, Vetter RS (2000). "Green lynx spider (Peucetia viridans) envenomation". The American journal of emergency medicine 18 (1): 64–6. PMID 10674536.
[edit] External links
- University of Florida Featured Creature (info and pictures)
