It was so nice outside I decided to take a stroll around the building at work. Along the way I spotted what looked like a pair of garden spiders trying to mate. The smaller one, which I'm assuming is the male, waved its front arms and tried to alternate between petting the female and dodging being lunch for her. Talk about a lunch break!
For the female's part, she tapped her back legs, almost impatiently, and stayed still otherwise. The male occasionally tried to 'bop' her in the lower-middle, but most of the time he just kept up the wavy arms dance.
I thought it was still too Winter for spider-mating...but I'm not expert on these things.
She was very beautiful. Much more red than the other garden spiders in the area. I made a mental note to mark each garden spider I noticed on the way back to the office and they were mostly yellow / golden colored. There were a few in the trees which were more brown. Perhaps it makes sense that she was red - I found her hanging off the light post near the rose garden. Do spiders take on the color of their surroundings?
