Six legs big, eight legs small

 A beetle dropped in to visit today. I found her* on my kitchen floor, very sleepy. I took her outside and gave her a drink, and she woke up and found a little friend.

Ground beetle and a friendly red spider mite.

Looks like she may have a mite on her back, too.

Side view, on wet painted board.

* I think she's a female because of the shape of her feet:

Front and rear feet. The males have wider and hairier feet. "The better to grab you with, my dear."

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Tuve una visita hoy. Me vino a ver un escarabajo de tierra; la* encontré en la cocina, muy soñolienta. La llevé afuera y le di un poco de agua para beber, y se animó. Y se encontró una amiguita.

Primera foto: el escarabajo (hembra) con un ácaro rojo.

Segunda foto: parece que puede tener un ácaro en la espalda también.

Tercera foto: vista de lado.

* Creo que es hembra, por las patas: los machos las tienen más anchas, y más peludas, parece que para poder detener mejor a la hembra.

Cuarta foto: las patas, anterior y posterior.

Spider and web

The blackberry thickets between the street and the White Rock beach are dying back for the winter. Berries, dingy black and shrivelled, hang under mostly-brown leaves. I found one berry bunch still glossy black and juicy. When I picked one, a spider ran out of it and across my hand. I didn't eat the berry.

This big cross spider has hung her* web at knee height between the path and the blackberries; as is their custom, just right to ambush an unwary beach-goer. I saw her first, though.

The blackberry canes are just far enough back to produce this bokeh.

I have joined the Flickr group, Aractober.

This group is similar to a 365 group, the goal is to post spiders to Flickr daily during October.

I don't think there's any purpose to this, other than just plain fun. And because October is a creepy-crawly-spider-ish month, what with Hallowe'en at the end. So: Arachnid/October.

Go see what's been posted already. Great photos!

*Mostly, I distinguish male spiders from females by the adult male's "boxing glove" pedipalps, but from this angle, they're hard to see clearly. On this female, however, the genital structures (epigyne) are unusually apparent.