Fragments From Floyd

It hasn't been a good fall for spider webs. The pasture grass hasn't had enough time to grow tall; first cutting was far too late in the summer, and new growth is still not quite knee high. We've had so little moisture in the air, too, that the morning fogs that give a crystal glaze to a backlit web just have not come as I'd hoped. But one day last week, I stood on the creekbank sweeping the view for a place for my eye and lens to rest as the sun crested the top of the ridge and spilled into the valley. Across the way, a tangle of web held some, but not much, visual interest, so even though the lighting wouldn't be right for another twenty minutes, I took one shot and came inside.

Later, when I saw the image full resolution on the screen, I realized why this particular web was not quite normal: it was a nursery web, and the tiny motes I had thought were fragments of the disintegrating boneset flowerheads from the stalks above it actually were tiny newly hatched spiders. You can see them if you click the image above and view the enlargement. (The filigreed leaf I think is millefoil also growing into the web.)

It's an interesting if not stellar image for viewing, I think. The living three-dimensionality of spider-specks moving out into space gives me the sense of a small world frozen in time--sort of a Big Bang of the Spider Cosmos, maybe.

And there's more to the story: I went back later in the day, after discovering the specks were spiderlings, to investigate. There are two more characters to show you--tomorrow, and Friday. So stay tuned.