SCHBFPER : COCOONING HABITS OF SPIDERS. 91 



derness and solicitude is a matter of common observation among 

 such families as the Lycosidae, the Dictynidae, and the Salti- 

 cidse. In the first of these families the young remain with the 

 mother for as much as two weeks, being carried about by her 

 as they cluster on her back. The salticids seal themselves up 

 in a silken sack with the eggs, and when the young hatch re- 

 main with them for a long time. The young dictynids occupy 

 the maternal snare for weeks, and without doubt are afforded 

 somefprotection and material help. Further observation will 

 most certainly establish the fact that spider mothers of many 

 species capture and bring food to their young, as do birds to 

 their nestlings. 



DISCUSSION BY FAMILIES. 



Family AGELENID^. 



This is a famil}^ of sheet-web weavers, represented in our 

 fauna mainly by the two genera, Agelena and Tegenaria; the 

 former found in open, grassy fields, the latter in sheltered 

 places, including barns, cellars, and outbuildings. There is 

 some difference between the two genera in cocooning habits. 

 Species of the genus Tegenaria construct cocoons whose exterior 

 envelope is homogeneous and continuous — not made up of two 

 valves. These cocoons number two or more usually, and are in 

 the shape of a flattened ball or are nearly globular. They are 

 placed either in the web, being suspended from it, or on some 

 object near the web. Sometimes this object is a little silken 

 hammock made especially for the purpose. It is very common, 

 also, to find the cocoon covered with bits of plaster, clay, or 

 debris of some sort. This habit of garnishing the cocoon on 

 the outside, or that of putting dirt between some of the en- 

 velopes, seems to obtain throughout nearly all the genera of the 

 family. 



The cocoon of the genus Agelena is more flattened, generally 

 plano-convex. It separates, when one attempts to tear it, into 

 two valves — a lower, silken rug or pad on which the eggs are 

 placed, and a covering of two or more layers of floss separated 

 by foreign debris. It is ordinarily attached by the plane face, 

 but Miss Staveley reports a species {Agelena hrunnea) that sus- 

 pends it by a stalk from a twig. Some species place the cocoon 



