Peacock Spiders Show Their Colors

If you are arachnophobic don’t continue with this post.

Laurie says:

I recently discovered these gorgeous photos of peacock spiders and wanted to share them.

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Peacock spiders are generally very small, about the size of a grain of rice. It’s the males that sport the ostentatious colouring; females have a more mottled look made up of browns, blacks and beiges.

Males will wave their abdomens and legs during a courtship dance. Some even have flaps that can be extended like a fan – hence the association with peacock birds.

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They all live in Australia and they all feature those amazing iridescent colours that the males will flaunt during courtship.

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The photos were taken by Museums Victoria’s Joseph Schubert, a 22-year-old peacock spider specialist.He’s now written up 12 of the 85 known species in this group. He often gets sent specimens to identify, but also conducts fieldwork.

I found them in a BBC science article here and found them irresistible.