MATERNAL INDUSTRY: COCOONS OF ORBWEAVERS. 



89 



Fig. 65. Egg mass of Epeira, showing 

 the under sheet and outer covering 

 removed. 



Interior 

 Structure 



overlaid, and the outer tent, four inches long, covered the others so com- 

 pletely that one might have supposed the wliole to be the work of one 

 spider. Undoubtedly, these works are precau- 

 tions against ])oth enemies and tlie weather, 

 which, although without experience of the ef- 

 fects of either upon her offspring, the mother 

 takes as though she really foresaw the danger. 

 If an egg nest of this class be opened 

 there will be found, in order, first, the outer 

 tent, separate from the covering of the cocoon ; second, a thin white 

 silken sheet, which is the outer envelope of tlie cocoon proper ; 

 third, the thick egg pad of curled silk, usually yellow ; fourth, 

 the eggs, a conical or hemispherical or spherical mass of small 

 yellow globules. (Fig. 04.) When the spider oviposits against a Hat sur- 

 face, the eggs arc generally laid upon a coating or sheet of silk spread 

 upon the surface, and the padding is then woven over it in the manner 

 of Argiope cophinaria. If the cocoon is suspended within a maze of lines, 

 the eggs are laid in the midst of the curled nest or egg pad, which is after- 

 wards completed. 



The cocoon of Ejieira cinerea shows a variation from the common type 

 of her congeners. The egg pad is a large flattened hemisphere, an inch 



in diameter, and one-fourth to three-eighths of 

 an inch thick. This is spun against some flat 

 surface, the boards of a shed, as I have seen it, 

 upon a light cushion of curled yellow silk. Over 

 and around this, on all sides, is woven the egg 

 pad, whicli is flattened down quite compactly, 

 and the whole mass lashed at the edges to the surface. The entire 

 cocoon has a diameter of one and five-eighths inch or more, and is a 

 quarter or three-eighths of an inch thick at the centre. (Fig. GO.) 



Fig. 66. Cocoon of Epeira cinerea. 



III. 



Epeira triaranea makes a cocoon of the conniion type, liut smaller. Of 

 two now before me, spun in bottles, one measures one-fifth of an inch, 

 and the other about half that. They are both round or ovoid 

 Epeira fly^yy iiiasses, itrotected by a maze of intersecting lines spun 

 ' around them. This maze is often thickened into a tent, in which 

 condition I have observed numbers spun in the angles of the joi,sts of a 

 cellar at Atlantic City, in the early spring (May 22d), full of young spider- 

 lings just ready to emerge. These cocoons measured one-half inch long, 

 which is somewhat above the normal length. 



One female was observed (New Lisbon, Ohio), whose cocoon was wrapped 

 up within a rolled leaf. This was swung to a cord, attached at one end 



