Jumpers

A super fun guest blog from law tutor, Sasha Haldane, and her fascination with jumping spiders. All Pics and ID from Sasha.

They call me Chrysilla!

Here a juvenile Epens

We met at my exhibition back in early 2019, and in 2020 she began to walk and take pictures of a range of “bugs” (used in the loosest term, as spiders are not true bugs). And what I find fascinating - beyond her ability to find these tiny critters - is her amazing photos, all taken with the Olympus TG 6, without post processing!

In her own words:

“I’ve always been really interested in wildlife. Growing up I wanted to be a marine biologist, instead I ended up doing law which I now teach part-time. This April I was on a walk with my kids and I saw a little gleaming, golden jumping spider on the railings. I took out my iphone to get a photo, and magnified on the screen I could see it doing a head tilt, as if it was wondering what the heck I was doing. Immediately a new obsession was born. I fell in love with jumping spiders – and graduated from my iphone to an Olympus TG 6. My photos are on instagram under ‘haldanesasha’ (and I often post on FB on the ‘Bugcity2’ page as well)”.

For bigger pics, simply click the image.

We went on a walk together, and I will post my own pics soon, but she was also a fascinating conversationist, like when she told me: “That Cytaea is male and you can tell because the palps are bulbous - they store reproductive ‘items’ in there..so apart from the hairier forelegs of spiders that are not particularly dimorphic like the Silers and Cytaea if the palps are bigger that is also a clue”…. Do check out her instagram account, as she is always adding new pics.

Here a female Siler, followed by a male Siler.

Not a true jumper, a Toxeus, or ant mimic; love these guys.