Looking closely at the leaves of the plants in my garden, I spotted a Striped Lynx Spider in the garden at my home in Gurgaon. At first, I thought it was a rolled-up dry leaf, but then on looking closer, I realised that it was a spider that I had probably never seen before.
When I blew up the photographs that I had taken of the spider I noticed, with a bit of horror the rather sharp, pointed spikes on its legs. Swallowing up my revulsion I realised that like the other spiders that I have photographed, this one too is beautiful to look at ( perhaps not with the naked eye but after magnification). I am sure the reader of this blogpost will accept that this is indeed a smart-looking spider!
Incidentally, I used a Canon 1500D with an IS-II 55-250mm zoom lens with an aperture of f-13, ISO setting of 800 and a shutter speed of 1/200. And yes I used a fill-in flash to get the colours right. To really appreciated the beauty of this arachnid, I would like the reader to zoom in as much as possible.
The Striped Lynx Spider (Oxyopes salticus) is a small spider that feeds on a variety of insect prey. It legs as you can see are full of spines. These spiders are ambush hunters that run after their prey often waving their two foremost legs. It is clear that they don't rely on webs to catch their prey. The one that I spotted lay in ambush on top of a leaf, that is before it hung upside down on one of the tendrils of a creeper. These spiders can be venomous so be careful which observing them.
