A couple of weeks ago I found a bunch of house spiders of various sizes in one of my notebooks. Thinking of my ants. I caught them in little plastic vials intending to freeze and feed them to my colonies. I gave them the largest spiders that same day... and they were a big hit.
But one of the spiders was just so tiny I didn't see the point of feeding it to the ants. It was much smaller than a fruit fly, About the size of the head of a pin. "well, if I feed you you won't be tiny for long" I thought. I had so much fun watching her catch and eat fruit flies... I started to feel like the witch from Hansel and Gretel... so I named her. Introducing Gretel! The common American house spider.
I've moved gretel into a slightly larger container and she's growing! I put one of the feeder fly pupae along with a few fruit flies in with her. To my surprise the fly hatched right away... none of the other pupae have hatched... I was planning on that being a treat for when she was larger... oh well...
Gretel will have the last laugh...
I'll post about her progress here. Anyway... I just hope I don't get attached to mealworms next.
OH NO IT'S TOO LATE.
(not really, though. The beatles remain on the menu. They are just too popular with lasius...)
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