Harvestman with egg ball (1 Viewer)

Caught this chap in my bedroom in the UK and noticed that he/she is carrying an egg ball, why?

I assumed they'd just lay eggs somewhere and it isn't it a bit late for them be to laying eggs now?



A

It's a spider, Pholcus phalangioides, a common species in houses. It has one or two English names.

Thanks Salticus, I thought it was a bit big for a Harvestman, so what about the egg ball, what's it up to?


A

I'm not sure what you want to know but this might help -
http://eol.org/pages/194/details

salticus said:

I'm not sure what you want to know but this might help -
http://eol.org/pages/194/details

Click to expand...

Thanks Salticus again, the articles says that they regularly carry egg cases but I wanted to know why.

Is it simple protection, are they looking for a safe and suitable position to leave them to mature? Just seems like an extra bit of protein for a lucky bird that snaffles the adult carrying eggs.



A

Pholcus lives indoors or in outbuildings (sheds etc) so is not normally vulnerable to birds. (What happens further South than the UK - is it a cave/crevice dweller? Not sure)

Welsh Peregrine said:

Pholcus lives indoors or in outbuildings (sheds etc) so is not normally vulnerable to birds. (What happens further South than the UK - is it a cave/crevice dweller? Not sure)

Click to expand...

I believe one of the English common names is Cave Spider, so presumably yes.

They seem to like the corners of my bathroom ceiling, where they hold on to their egg balls until they hatch into spiderlings which disperse quickly. There only ever seems to be one egg bearer (female?) in the room at any one time, so presumably territorial.

Despite having mild arachnophobia, I tend to apply my grandmother's saying: "If you want to live and thrive, let a spider run alive". This is obviously true, as they are predators that are generally harmless to humans in the UK. They certainly seem to keep the cockroaches down (as I've never had any ).

Edit: the odd thing is that they always seem to appear in my bathroom, which is deeply buried in the middle of our building with no exterior window, just an extractor fan, through which they presumably enter from the roof space as it turns chilly in autumn - should be due any day now, like that Black-throated Blue Warbler on Scilly.

Clearly they also keep Black-throated Blue Warblers down, as I haven't had any of them!