TEXAS NATURE OBSERVATIONS AND REMINISCENCES. 55 



not much lareer than a pin head. 

 They were of crab form, hairy, 

 and showed well-developed spin- 

 ing claws and six eycTlenses, on 

 microscopic examination. The il- 

 lustration shows how the mother 

 spider, after preparing the inside 

 funnel-shaped breeding nest — 

 and which contains innumerous 

 spider eggs— artistically spun its 

 delicate threads from one edge of 

 the spoon over the other margin, 

 thus covering the breeding nest 

 which serves to protect the young 

 developed brute as well as to en- 

 tangle insects, which later serve 

 as food. 

 The greatest enemy of spiders 



rolled around and around, until, 

 after several attempts, it succeed- 

 ed in plunging its sharp stinger 

 into the spider's body, and it ex- 

 pired at once. After this it car- 

 ried its victim to a nearby hole, 

 and disappeared with the tarantu- 

 la under ground. The illustration 

 in these pages I reproduced for 

 this article from Harper's Illus- 

 trated Journal, as it is a fine and 

 lifelike presentation of this pe- 

 culiar vicious and useful wasp. 



It is an interesting study to 

 note the breeding cycles qX spiders 

 and some years ago, whilst engag- 

 ed in some private entomological 

 research and microscopic study of 



A Pais of Small Prairie Tarantulas with Breeding Nest and 

 Cocoon IN Hollow op a Tree Bark. 



is a. large, yellowish-brown wasp 

 — a " ground vrasp. This wasp 

 haunts the tarantula's breeding 

 nest, attacks the spider unaware, 

 inoculating it after a deadly duel 

 and drags it into its underground^ 

 breeding hole. A friend of mine 

 —a fanner— ;witnessed such a bat- 

 tle last year in a cotton field. It 

 was a large, black tarantula, 

 crawling along the mesqiiite grass 

 and cotton furrows, whepce all 

 of a sudden one of the '"tarantula 

 killers" — a long, brown, wasp- 

 came along, attacked the, spider- 

 always from the abdominal side, 

 and a fierce battle to the death 

 ensued. Wasp and tarantula 



the arachnid family, several mi- 

 croscopic mountings of the ova in 

 different stiages of development 

 were prepared. Also, a breeding nest 

 with myriads of young spiders, entan- 

 gled in the interior web linings of 

 the cocoon is seen elsewhere, rep- 

 resenting the broodnest of our 

 large orange and black colored 

 prairie spider — the same species 

 represented in the photo illustra- 

 tion showing three prairie spiders. 

 It was during a hunting trip, in 

 a severe cold winter month, out 

 in the postoak valley of the Olmos, 

 that I ca^ie across tlos interestini,' 

 nest. It was suspended on the 



