Sunday 16 February 2014

what else lives in weta roosts ....

Another day at the office today ...

 
Went out this afternoon to continue on with my weta work and was reminded very quickly that if weta aren't living in a roost, it does not mean nothing else will be!
 
 
Not only did I find two of these big spiders in one roost (the other ran away very very quickly once I opened the roost) but in one roost I found 3 cave weta.
 
I did some quick mathematics today, 14 roosts have been inspected, with 9 of these being inhabited by tree weta. That's a 62% hit rate. Melissa told me that that is a really good find rate.
Weta would usually select natural roosts over an artificial ones, so that fact that we are finding weta in these artificial homes, must mean that their natural choices are full. YAY!
 
I have gotten better at spotting weta holes in natural places as well, I took a couple of photos today within a few metres of each other. I know they are weta roosts because the entrance hole is super clean (I think weta have a bit of OCD when it comes to cleaning!)
 
 
I zoomed in pretty close to get these this size. Further down the tree there were also other holes. Roosts will normally have more than one entrance.
 
 
A huntsman spider in a roost ....
 
 

1 comment:

  1. Can't believe I am really interested in hearing about wetas ... I used to hate them as a kid as loads of them lived in the toilet block at church camp!!!

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