COCOON LIFE AND BABYHOOD. 



241 



On June 11th, one week after the hatching of the young Lycosids, one 

 hundred had abandoned the maternal perch and were dispersed over the 

 inner surfnce of tlie jar and upon a series of lines stretched from side to 

 side. About half as many more remaint'd upon the mother's back, but 

 by the 13th, two days thereafter, all had dismounted. In the meantime 

 they had increased in size at least half, apparently without food.' 



One summer, at the steamboat landing of Lake Saratoga, New York, 

 between the platform and the logs driven as piles to protect it, I observed 

 a large nest of interlacing lines within which hung a round co- 

 Young pQQj-^ fj.Q,^^ jjf^if ^Q three-fourths of an inch in diameter. Imme- 

 medes diately beneath the cocoon many young spiders were massed in 

 colony, lianging inverted, in the usual posture, from the crossed 

 lines of the maze. Tliese were 

 the little fellows who liad been 

 hatched within the swinging 

 egg bag, and who had doulit- 

 less issued therefrom within 

 the last week or ten da^'s. At 

 least, they were so well grown 

 that they might have been of 

 that age. 



The cocoon was so evi- 

 dently of tlie Lycosid charac- 

 ter that I was for a, moment 

 perplexed to iind it in such 

 a position. But, rememljering 

 the habit of Dolomedes, I in- 

 ferred that this may have been 

 tlie cocoon nest of one of the 

 large Dolomede spiders tlint 

 frequent the l>orders of ouv 

 American lakes and other wa- 

 ters. I ca[)tured some of the 

 young spiders, with some diifi- 

 culty however, for they were 

 old and active enough to scamper away upon tlie least agitalion of the 

 snare. An examination showed that they were young Dolomedes, proba- 

 bly Dolomedes tenebrosus, a spiiler that attains great size under favor- 

 able circumstances. No doubt, the mother had carried her cocoon along 

 the shore, hiding among rocks or underneath the platform of the boat 

 landing, until Nature prompted her to the last action characteristic of her 



263. View of Dolomede cocoon in site, and i):irt of tlie 

 brood hanging to the supporting lines. 



Proceeding's .\c;i(l. Nat. Sci., Pliila., 1SS4, pafie IIJS, "How Lycosa fabricates licr round 



