Free Range Photography

Over the course of a week I watched the world of this little branch overhanging the river transform from the realm of a spider with a beautiful web and dozens of captured gnats into a web in ruins, no sign of the spider, and some kind of fly patrolling the wreckage. I know nothing about spiders or insects, but found this scene fascinating.

The blurry clump of gnats to the right is part of the cached food, but some other kind of storage set-up is along the branch going from the center of the photo to the left. It looks like the gnats are bound to the twig with silk.

About a week later I looked at the same branch and found it dramatically changed. I couldn’t see the spider at all, the web was destroyed, and there seemed to be many more captured gnats in what remained of the web.

This fly was busily moving about, seemingly investigating the scene. I couldn’t tell if it was feeding, but it did seem to be preoccupied with the gnats.

In the video, the spider seems to be processing something. It’s easy to overlook these tiny creatures living in their complex world just a few feet away when my eyes are constantly scanning far and wide for birds or other creatures. If anyone has any insight into what was going on here, please let me know!