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During my first spider hunting excursion 10 days ago I found a little spider that I thought was one of the trash-line spiders (genus Cyclosa) but I was informed by Rod Crawford that it was instead an immature male Neriene digna, which is a member of the family Linyphiidae. Since N. digna is said to be relatively common, that specimen had a rather distinct reticulated pattern on the abdominal margins, I routinely see Neriene litigiosa (Sierra Dome Spider) which occupies similar habitat, and there are only 3 Neriene spp. in our region, I resolved to keep an eye out for some mature specimens. And exactly a week later I found several of them, in varying stages of maturity, out at Cape Horn on the Washington side of the Columbia River Gorge. Now I just need to find N. radiata!
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My spider mentor Rod Crawford says “The species makes a two-level sheet web, a hammock-like sheet above and a smaller, possibly protective (of the spider) sheet below; as in all linyphiids, the spider hangs on the underside of the main sheet. The web is superficially like the “bowl-and-doily spider” Frontinella, which doesn’t occur west of the Cascades. N. digna has no common name, though it’s a very common spider. Linyphiid webs have no known sticky silk but work mechanically; the tangle above the sheet knocks prey down onto the sheet. See my image of a web here: https://crawford.tardigrade.net/journal/album7514.html third row, right.”
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Description– Small (3.8-5.2mm) mostly dark brown to red spider with white dots or netlike white markings on the lateral parts of the abdomen; legs are about the length of the body, and banded; mature males have very large genital bulbs at the end of their pedipalps, and the mature females have a “protruding epigynum that is the giveaway – not seen in either of the 2 other species found in the region. The dorsal and ventral abdomen coloration (in combination, not either separately) are also pretty characteristic.Rod Crawford.” Species Neriene digna – BugGuide.Net
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Similar species– Neriene litigiosa (Sierra Dome Spider) is larger, with longer legs and a mostly white dorsal abdomen with a dark cross, and builds a distinctive domed web; Neriene radiata also builds a dome shaped web, although it is more steeply pitched than that of Neriene litigosa, the ventral abdomen is black, there is a wide, dark, broken mark in the middle of the otherwise white dorsal abdomen, and the females have a white border around the carapace.
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Habitat– Brushy forests and woodlands at low to mid elevations.
Range– Native to far western North America; in the PNW it appears to be found primarily west of the Cascades, and in sw Oregon/nw California. Observations · iNaturalist
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Eats– Known to feed on small Diptera and leafhoppers.
Eaten by– Presumably preyed upon by insectivores of all classes, and possibly parasitized by the larvae of pompilid wasps.
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Adults active– From BugGuide and iNaturalist observations it seem these spiders can be found almost year around, and there appear to be adults about from April into December.
Life cycle– I can find nothing specific to this species.
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Etymology of names– Neriene was the wife of Mars in Roman mythology, and as a noun the word meant bravery, but Blackwall didn’t explain the reference. The specific epithet digna appears to be from the Latin word for ‘fit/worthy’, but Keyserling doesn’t tell us what was particularly worthy or fit about this spider.
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Species Neriene digna – BugGuide.Net
https://www.fs.usda.gov/pnw/pubs/pnw_gtr207.pdf
Sheet Web Spider, Neriene digna
Neriene digna (Neriene digna) – JungleDragon
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