Cleanup Crew - _TNY_5783
When I first heard the claim that harvestmen like this Opilio canestrinii are known to pick food out of spider webs, I dismissed this as random occurrances - but it turns out to be really quite common.
This common wasp (Vespula vulgaris) got stuck and was killed in the web of a male Europan garden spider (Araneus diadematus) just outside our front door. The web later looked disheveled and abandoned and every time I got home I saw it and thought that I should remove it - and the remains of the wasp - as it looked a little untidy.
I always seemed to have my hands full when passing so I never got around to it which this harvestman was only too happy about. A couple of days later I found it busy with munching on the wasp. No idea what happened to the spider - perhaps he was off to find a nice mama spider to get busy with.
Cleanup Crew - _TNY_5783
When I first heard the claim that harvestmen like this Opilio canestrinii are known to pick food out of spider webs, I dismissed this as random occurrances - but it turns out to be really quite common.
This common wasp (Vespula vulgaris) got stuck and was killed in the web of a male Europan garden spider (Araneus diadematus) just outside our front door. The web later looked disheveled and abandoned and every time I got home I saw it and thought that I should remove it - and the remains of the wasp - as it looked a little untidy.
I always seemed to have my hands full when passing so I never got around to it which this harvestman was only too happy about. A couple of days later I found it busy with munching on the wasp. No idea what happened to the spider - perhaps he was off to find a nice mama spider to get busy with.