Setting the Jumping Spider Free

It has finally gotten warm enough to set my pet Phiddipus audax free.

I first noticed her in the fall of last year sitting on my balcony window looking a bit cold. So I brought her in and noticed she wasn't even full grown yet.

This is what she looked like when I first brought her in to the house and put her in the cricket enclosure that I use for my pet tarantulas. She was only about the size of a corn kernel so I named her spidercorn.

She really lucked out in escaping the winter and loved the cricket enclosure and beefed up quickly. I counted her molt about 4 times while I had her.

This is her at almost full size before her last molt when she still had an orange spot on her back.

Now she is full grown but not quite plumped up to full size. Her orange spot is gone and she just needs to eat a couple more crickets.

Here she is today on the balcony right as I let her go on a posy planter to guard them from aphids.

She quickly found a new home under the leaves. Periodically she will come out and wait for flies to come by to pounce on.

I've seen her hanging around this flower a few times. I'm not sure about how far a jumping spider range is but I suspect she may visit the neighbors balconies as well and perhaps meet a male jumping spider and start a sling of spiderlings sometime.

This is a video I took of her right before letting her go on the balcony. Hopefully this fall I'll find another one to keep over the winter. They make great pets and are super friendly and tame as well as easy to keep. Who knows maybe this fall I'll be able to keep one of her spiderlings as a winter guest.

That's all for now, thanks for looking :-)