CHAPTER X. 

 THE FEATHERFOOT SPIDER, ULOBORUS PLUMIPES. 



I. 



THE remarkable genus Uloborus is represented by at least two species in 

 the United States, namely, Uloborus mammeatus Hentz, and Uloborus 

 plumipes Lucas (Phillyra riparia Hentz). These spiders closely 

 UloborcB resemble each other in structure and, as far as I know, have no 

 difference in habit. The genus, in both its species, is widely 

 distributed over the United States, probably covering the entire 

 area. I have traced its distribution from New England, in the States of 

 Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, southward to New Jersey, 

 through the District of Columbia, to Florida. Moving westward, along the 

 Gulf States, it was found by Hentz in Alabama, and by myself in Texas. 

 Specimens have been sent me from Wisconsin, where the Peckhams have 

 observed it, and I have collected it at various points in Eastern and Cen- 

 tral Pennsylvania. This record of distribution would indicate that the 

 spider probably occupies the whole area of the United States, with the 

 possible exception of the Pacific coast; and I have no doubt that it will 

 be found there also. Plumipes is found in Europe, as are other species of 

 the genus. Uloborus is not of modern origin, as the family, at least, is 

 represented among the fossil spiders of the amber. 



My studies of Featherfoot's local habitat show some decided prefer- 

 ences for moist, low, and well shaded sites, but indicate a quite miscella- 

 neous taste. In Connecticut I found its snares in the decayed 

 Flume hollows of old stumps or cavities beneath their roots, and spun 

 Orb Sites near ^ ne g roun( ^ upon the low underbrush of thickets. One very 

 large colony of young spiders was found on laurel bushes at the 

 foot of Brush Mountain, Pennsylvania, above one of the branches of the 

 Juniata River. Their snares were swung at the height of four feet and 

 less above the surface. In the neighborhood of Philadelphia I have found 

 them quite low down, swung between the stalks of a blackberry thicket, 

 and once only within a shallow cavity among the stones of an abandoned 

 mill dam. I have always happened to observe them in moist places near 

 running streams. In Texas I found Uloborus, probably Mammeatus, in 

 bushes on the uplands south of Austin, above the deep gorge of Barton 

 Creek. 



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