Strictly speaking, this posting doesn’t have much to do with the shop. However, I found this discovery interesting, so I thought I’d post it.
After I built the shop a few years ago, my wife suggested I do some simple landscaping to dress up the exterior up a bit. We installed a short section of split rail, spread some bark, planted yellow day lilies and black-eyed-Susan perennials and moved a white butterfly bush from another area of the yard. It took the butterfly bush a few years to recover and get itself reestablished but this year it’s doing very well.
One beautiful summer evening recently, I was looking the butterfly bush over closely and noticed this female Yellow and Black Argiop spider had built a web down in the middle of the bush. She’s a large spider and had captured several other insects in her web, having killed them and wrapped them in silk.
The Black and Yellow Argiop is a common garden spider found throughout most of North America. It’s quite common to see the females in their webs in late summer and early fall as they prepare to lay their eggs. Though the females are usually large and may appear intimidating, these spiders are totally harmless to humans. They are great insect predators and should be left alone. I avoid destroying spiders, and for that matter pretty much any other creature. I find snakes absolute fascinating and wouldn’t dream killing or harming one… I have no reason to (we don’t have dangerous snakes in our area).
I simply prefer to observe nature undisturbed… like this pretty Yellow and Black Argiop spider.
