Cucumber green spider (Araniella cucurbitina)

📌 Overview

The Cucumber Green Spider is a small, bright green orb-weaving spider commonly found across Europe and parts of Asia. Despite its vivid coloration, it is well camouflaged in foliage, where it spins small orb webs and preys on insects.

🔍 Identification

• Size:
  • Females: 4–9 mm.
  • Males: 3–5 mm.
• Color: Vivid green body with a small red or black spot near the rear of the abdomen.
• Shape: Rounded abdomen, relatively small cephalothorax.
• Legs: Pale green to yellowish.

🌍 Distribution & Habitat

• Range: Widespread across Europe and into parts of Central Asia.
• Habitat: Common in gardens, hedgerows, shrubs, and woodland edges; often found on leaves and low vegetation.

🍽️ Diet

• Diet: Insectivorous – captures small flying insects in its web or by ambush.
• Hunting Style: Builds a small orb web or waits in ambush on leaves.

🪺 Life Cycle & Reproduction

• Mating: Spring and early summer.
• Eggs: Females lay eggs in a silken sac hidden under leaves.
• Lifecycle: Overwinters as an immature spider; matures the following spring.

🧠 Interesting Facts

• The spider’s green coloration provides excellent camouflage among leaves, making it difficult for predators and prey to detect.
• It is harmless to humans.
• Often confused with similar green species (like Araniella opisthographa), but A. cucurbitina can be distinguished by microscopic genital features.

📊 Conservation Status

IUCN Red List: Not evaluated, but considered common and not threatened in most of its range.

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