"The Itty Bitty Spider and I." a poem by James DeAngelis

[Guested Account]

There is a spider in one of my guest bathroom.

It has a web at one of the corner of the floor over where the baseboard meets each other and form an L.

The web is probably 2 square inch large.

The spider is about the size of a pin prick.

I took a look at it with a magnifying glass and it's 2 balls connected to each other like an 8:

one smaller: its head; one larger: its body.

I've first noticed the web about 3 weeks ago. 

Most folks' reaction is to immediately kill it and swat the web away;

or to run out of the bathroom screaming like a scaredy girl: 

"Spider! Spider! There is a spider in the bathroom! EEEEK!".

I left it alone - spiders are good for the household environment.

I have been checking on it every few days.

About 2 weeks ago there was a fly in the house. I caught it and drop it into the web.

The fly was struggling to get out of the web - trying to fly out.

The spider did nothing for about 2 minutes and then boom, it pounced on the fly:

going to it, going in circles around it, underneath it, above it, back and forth and before you know it, the fly was encased in its web and no longer moving.

Few days ago I checked on the spider and its still there but where did the fly go?

The web was empty again.

Tonight I caught a small roach, about the size of a grain of rice.

I drop it in and this time, instead of waiting, the spider pounced on it immediately and within minutes, the roach was also encased in spider web.

It's amazing how a tiny spider the size of a pin prick can in no time encase a fly or a roach almost 3 times its size.

According to several websites, household spiders help control the pest population.

They don't just built a web and then wait for an unfortunate household pest to fall into it.

They also leave their webs and go hunting for food looking for household pests like roaches, flies, moths, etc.

If that's true, then this must be a lazy spider because except for the fly and the roach I threw into its web, I haven't seen any other web encased insects in it.

Of all the Itty Bitty Spiders that had to visit my house, I had to get a lazy one.

 

Edited September 6, 2017 by j7wild

[Guested Account]

So the roach the size of a grain of rice I dropped in over 24 hours ago is gone.

Where did it go?

I saw it getting encased in spider web.

You can see the floor tile below the spider web being the spider web is clear to the naked eye.

There is nothing on the floor tile below it.

The spider is still there and I think it has gotten a bit bigger than a pin prick.

[Guested Account]

I looked in on my unexpected guest tonight and the web is still there but I don't see its resident.

Where did it go?

There are no cracks or crevices or holes in the baseboard and wall the web is built on for the spider to go hide into.

I caught a small fly and dropped it onto the next and it struggled and struggled to fly away but the spider didn't come.