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Comments & ID Thoughts
This was seen on a life vest (that's what the red fabric is) near a lake boating area, and is the size of a thumb.
- Submitted by:
- Submitted: Apr 12, 2018
- Photographed: Apr 11, 2018
- Spider: Larinioides (Furrow Spiders)
- Location: Morgan's Point, Texas, United States
- Spotted Outdoors: Freshwater river, lake, stream
- Found in web?: No
- Attributes: Dorsal
Help identify this spider
Apr 19, 2020
Apr 19, 2020
Milford, 
Hi, welcome to Spider ID. 🙂 This is a Furrow Orb-weaver (Larinioides sp.).
Hi ItsyBitsy,
The pattern seems to match that of some (but not necessarily others), but the forelegs seem significantly larger than the other legs in this specimen than in other photos, which I would expect to be an important difference. Is there that much individual or regional variation? How likely is it that others I see online are identified as wrong species?
Yes, there is considerable variation in abdominal pattern – the legs look OK to me … maybe the back legs are just curled under. I suspect it’s L. cornutus but I’m not certain enough to file it there from this image. Here is one similar to yours.
https://bugguide.net/node/view/1074308/bgimage
According to https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.570.6095, among others, there are only 3 known holarctic species: cornutus, patagiatus, and sclopetarius. “Furrow” appears to refer specifically to cornutus, while “Bridge” or “Gray Cross” refers to sclopetarius. They all seem to look more like each other (including the mark on the back, which reminded me of the Quake video game logo when I first saw it) than like others which are supposedly of the same species; how do you tell the difference between them? Edit: Ok, I see that Furrow also refers to the genus; perhaps you should indicate this to reduce confusion, such as “the… Read more »
Hi, sclopetarius was changed to seraticus (Šestáková, Marusik & Omelko, 2014) then changed back to sclopetarius (Breitling & Bauer, 2015) … never a dull moment. BugGuide is up to date on this name change: https://bugguide.net/node/view/119789 There are tricks to telling them apart. L. patagiatus and L. sclopetarius have an extra band on leg IV, the pattern on the abdomen of L. sclopetarius tends to have a more sculptured appearance and the swirls of hair on the carapace are more prominent. L. cornutus has a smoother appearance. L. patagiatus has a slightly rougher looking pattern on the abdomen. There’s a chance… Read more »