2nd and 3rd day of shooting Black Widows.

It's the season, we have crickets galore and the Black Widows know it. Where they are crickets there are Black Widows.

Three days in a row now I have shot photos of Black Widows. The first night I shot a photo was when I pulled in the my garage after the Baby Meeting last Tuesday night and saw a huge BW in it's web just outside the garage. Then Our local newspaper, the Desert Sun, came out with a front section photo and article on Black Widows the day after I shot my first Black Widow. My competitive juices started flowing and now I am trying to see what kind of interesting shots I can capture of these Black Widows. The spiders aren't quite so skittish anymore. I guess they're getting used to me.

We have another two Black Widows living near the front gate too. They've been living there for a couple of years now. They live inside the drainage pipe that runs down the side of the condo during the heat of the day.

Saturday morning Ray found this BW, just outside our back door. It was in a ball, not moving and looking either very sick or dead. Looking dead that is until I used the pointed long end of a leaf to touch the spider trying to see if she'd move. I noticed some movement, but not much. I really thought she was dying.

Photo taken with a Canon 40D, 100mm 2.8 macro lens, hand held in early morning shade.


This morning Ray went out the back door again (to fill the bird bath with water (water evaporates daily in these 114 degree days). He came back in letting me know my spider was back and moving about in his web. I thought this can't be the same spider. The spider I saw yesterday was barely moving as it lay in a ball on the concrete. But Ray thinks it is the same spider. It was in the exact same area but I don't know if they are one and the same.
Photo taken with my small Canon Powershot A650, zoomed in only a tiny bit, set to manual macro, and shot in early morning shade.

Sleeping Black Widow

Got back home from the meeting tonight to find Mrs. Spider in her web; probably fast asleep as she did not move when I approached her with my camera from a foot away. I wonder if Black Widows jump?

Anyway, I got a much better photo of her and her trademark red-spot-on-the-belly than I did the other night. (click photo to enlarge)

Uninspired, no time, not enough experience.

That's how I feel about the intermittent stolen time with my camera today.

I shot more of the blue vase. Didn't like a one.

While driving my car inside the garage, I spotted a black widow just outside the garage on a wall. I ran inside for my camera and began taking some photos of the spider. She was big. Mrs. Spider didn't like the flash much. I was sitting on the ground hoping to get a picture of the red spot, when I felt something on my leg. I thought that something was Mrs Spider, or a relative spider. I got right up and figured that was enough shooting.

Soooo, no photos today. Well, I'll post proof I used the camera today.

Thursday after 10am is mine to go play with the camera and various lens.