Meet our new pet...

His name is "Chitchee"

(named by Addie)

He is a black and yellow striped spider who

lives in the daisy bushes by our front porch

and spins a beautiful new web every night while we're sleeping.

I explained to Addie that spiders build webs as they're home

and as a way to catch other bugs so they'll have something

to eat. I told her that if a bug gets caught in the web

the spider rushes to his prey and immediately starts spinning

it up in the silk string the spider produces.

So we decided to try and feed

Chitchee so she could see this process

I had just explained to her. The first couple attempts

of dropping little bugs into the web didn't work. They would

just fall or squirm out of the web. So I got some tweezers

and caught a little grasshopper. We stuck that sucker

right into the web and let Chitchee come and get it.

Sure enough...The slight movement of the grasshopper in the web

caused Chitchee to rush to his prey and start the

spinning process.

It was incredible. He had that grasshopper all spun

up with in seconds. In this pic you can actually see

the silk coming out from his abdomen as he is

finishing up.

All finished. After Chitchee was done wrapping up

the grasshopper he left him alone for little bit

(probably to finish up dying) the went in for the feast.

The next morning the grasshopper was gone and

another beautiful web had been spun.

I have to admit I'm not a fan of spiders but it's been

fun to feed Chitchee and watch him.