Spider vs Bee

By Ann F.

I took this photo the other day in my 100% organic garden. I went to sniff flowers I love that attract the bees and this! I send the pic into the local entomologist and here is his response I thought maybe you would share the photo. I have lived here 27 years and never encountered this guy!

What a beautiful photo. The honey bee is being eaten by a green lynx spider, genus Peucetia (family Oxyopidae). There are two species in our area, but Peucetia longipalpis seems most likely—microscopic characters would have to be observed to separate the two.

These are ruthless sit-and-wait predators on flowers. Like most spiders that don’t hunt with webs, these hold their prey in their jaws for some time while they inject digestive enzymes. Once those do their work, they mash up and slurp out the contents of the prey’s body (spiders can’t swallow the outer hard parts)! Here at the Museum we’ve had to remove these spiders from our butterfly pavilion occasionally, where they present quite the hazard to our winged livestock!