Green Lynx Spider

''Peucetia viridans'', the green lynx spider, is a bright-green lynx spider usually found on green plants. It is the largest North American species in the family Oxyopidae. This spider is common in the southern U.S., Mexico, Central America, and in many West Indies islands, especially Jamaica.

Description

The body of the female may be as much as long. The male is smaller, being more slender and averaging in length. There often is a red patch between the eyes, with a few red spots on the body. The eye region is clothed with white appressed hairs. The dorsal surface of the abdomen bears about six Chevron-like marks with the centres pointing forward. The legs are green to yellow, bearing long black spines such as appear on the legs of most species of Oxyopidae, and with a generous scattering of black spots. ''Peucetia viridans'' is confusingly similar to ''Peucetia longipalpis'', the other ''Peucetia'' species to occur in the United States, but ''Peucetia longipalpis'' tends to have a shorter, fatter, more domed abdomen, with less pronounced markings in its upper surface.

Late in the season ''Peucetia viridans'' is prone to change its colour from predominantly green to paler yellow, typically with streaks of reddish, suggesting degradation of the tetrapyrrole pigment in the blood. Gravid females may change their color to fit their background. This takes about 16 days.

Habits

The female constructs one to five egg sacs in September and October, each containing 25 to 600 bright orange eggs, which she guards, usually hanging upside down from a sac and attacking everything that comes near. Remarkably, one of her means of defense is to squirt (spit) venom from her chelicerae, sometimes for a distance of about a foot (300 mm). The eggs hatch after about two weeks, and after another two weeks fully functional spiderlings emerge from the sac. They pass through eight instars to reach maturity.

Human interest

The green lynx spider very seldom bites humans, and when it does, its venomous bite, though painful, is not deadly but may cause surrounding swelling (edema) up to 7"-10" in diameter.

The species is primarily of interest for its usefulness in agricultural pest management, for example in cotton fields. The spiders have been observed to hunt several moth species and their larvae, including some of the most important crop pests, such as the bollworm moth ('' Helicoverpa zea''), the cotton leafworm moth ('' Alabama agrillacea''), and the cabbage looper moth (''Trichoplusia ni''). However, they also prey on beneficial insects, such as honey bees.Weems, H. V., Jr. and Whitcomb, W. H. Green Lynx Spider, ''Peucetia viridans'' (Hentz) (Arachnida: Araneae: Oxyopidae). EENY-249 Entomology and Nematology Department, Florida Cooperative Extension Service, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, University of Florida. Published: November 2001. Revised March 201

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Distribution

This species occurs in the southern United States, California, Mexico, Central America, the West Indies, and Venezuela.

Name

The species name, ''viridans'', is Latin for "becoming green". It should not be confused with either '' P. viridana'', a species that occurs only in India and Myanmar, or '' P. viridis'' from Spain and Africa.

Images

File:Green lynx spider Peucetia viridans.jpg, Peucetia viridans, Female, Mason Regional Park, Irvine CA
File:Peucetia viridans Green lynx spider.jpg, Peucetia viridans, Female, Mason Regional Park, Irvine CA
File:Female Green Lynx Spider.jpg, Green lynx spider, Chesapeake, VA
File:Green Lynx Spider (Male).jpg, Male Green Lynx Spider, Chesapeake, VA
File:Green Lynx Spider feasting.jpg, Green Lynx vs Pisauridae, IN
File:Green Lynx spider in our garden...jpg, Green Lynx spider in our garden, Big Bear City, CA 92314
File:Green Linx Spider 2.jpg
File:Green Lynx Spider in Tyler Texas.jpg, On a rose in Tyler, Texas
File:Green lynx spider with carpenter bee.jpg, Female Green lynx spider with her carpenter bee prize in Fort Mill, SC
File:Peucetia Viridans (Green Lynx Spider - TX) 01.jpg, alt=Green Lynx Spider, Green Lynx Spider in North Houston, TX (July 2021)
File:Green Lynx spider Vs Indian Yellow Paper Wasp 3.jpg, Green Lynx Spider vs Yellow paper wasp in West Bengal, India.

References

Green lynx spider
on the UF / IFAS Featured Creatures Web site

External links

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{{Taxonbar, from=Q1968737

Oxyopidae
Spiders of South America
Spiders of North America
Spiders described in 1832
Taxa named by Nicholas Marcellus Hentz