Hi, arachnophilia.
arachnophilia writes:
how come the answer to "what's this spider?" is always "orb weaver"?
I don't usually get a lot of people asking about orb weavers: usually, it's a wolf spider or agelenid funnel weaver that somebody thought was a brown recluse, because it's brown.
But, orb weavers are usually highly visible (because they build big, spiral webs up in open air where people can see them), and they are often brightly colored and/or oddly shaped. So, they tend to arouse more curiosity than other spiders.
-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)
Darwin loves you.