I think that she is the same spider who was hiding behind my towel earlier this week, who fell into the shower when I took the towel to dry myself. I rescued her from the tub and she seemed okay then, and a few days later when I posted the observation. She was alive last night, dead today. I’m trying to understand what happened.
There is an old roach bait in one corner of the room, but I doubt if a spider would get into roach bait. I have not seen any roaches, live or dead, in that room for months, so I can’t see how she would have eaten a poisoned roach. What explanation could there be?
There’s really no way of knowing for sure, but it could have just been the end of his (that spider is actually a male) lifespan. My house growing up was (and still is) full of these, we always just left them alone as they are harmless and help control pests, and they can actually live a surprisingly long time (multiple years), but that one still could have just been old and at the end of its life.
As a side note, I don’t think there’s any need to put trigger warning for spiders on inaturalist of all places
Adult male spiders typically have a pretty short lifeapan and in many short lifed spiders they will die within few weeks after maturing.
Very generally speaking:
In web building spiders many males will stop producing webs and thus catching prey (sometimes they will steal food from the females web, though). Instead they start roaming around (and be more frequently observed then their conspecific females) in search for mating partners. In some species of course the mating can be the quick end of the male in any case due to predation by the female. In others, where cannibalism is less likely, they will still exhaust themselfs quickly during the mating season and die soon.
Even in tarantulas, with adult lifespans of up to 20 years the males will often already die after 2-3 years.
The urge to mate is one of the biggest drivers in males and can largey outweigh the urge to eat (or even survive ). One can even observe this in mammals. I observed stray dogs in places where strays are treated well and many dogs look good.. the ones that are very thin are usual the (not neutered) males, busy with territory business and finding females.
Hmm… I was looking for the enlarged palps which I associate with male spiders and didn’t think I saw them.
As it turned out, last night he was ‘only mostly dead.’ He had lain still and curled up all day and looked dead; but when I tried to retrieve the body, he staggered around for a bit, and a few hours later had moved a few feet and was again lying still and curled up.
So now I have another Southern House Spider – this one in the living room, possibly living behind the bookshelf. How do I go about offering it water? Just put out a shallow dish nearby, or is there a better way?
One way is to soak the end of a Q-tip in water and then put the wet end in front of the spider. If the spider is thirsty it will come up to the Q-tip and suck water out of it. A similar method is to use a cotton ball, although wet cotton balls are more unwieldy to handle. You can also take a plant mister and just spray some drops of water near it, although this can startle the spider and cause it to run away. A dish of water might work, but if the spider is really weak it might accidentally drown.
). One can even observe this in mammals. I observed stray dogs in places where strays are treated well and many dogs look good.. the ones that are very thin are usual the (not neutered) males, busy with territory business and finding females.