Are you a fan of Citizen Science, where volunteers assist real scientists in any of several ways? You'll want to answer a call from Dr Catherine Scott, a spider scientist. At the end of May 2022 she shared on Twitter a call for nature fans to report their spider sightings. She wrote:
Have you started to see candy-striped spiders out & about? Please help us to learn more about these introduced predators in North America by joining the Spider Hunters project!
Dr Scott is an arachnologist and spider advocate, a natural historian
and behavioral ecologist. She used to be afraid of spiders, but now she spends much of her time outdoors searching for spiders and learning new things about their lives. Dr Scott is also active in social media conversations about the natural world. You can find her posts on Twitter at @Cataranea. On July 6 she wrote:
Candy-striped spider season is now well upon us! Please keep an eye out for these spiders and submit your observations to @inaturalist, where they will automatically be added to the #SpiderHunters project. Thanks!If you're not on iNaturalist, please feel free to submit sightings to me directly: email photos to mail@spiderhunters.ca!
These candy-striped spiders are not dangerous to people! They hitchhiked a ride to North America on human ships. In North America, candy-striped spiders are an unexpected predator for insects that pollinate flowers.
Dr Scott goes on to add:
Do I know anyone in Saskatchewan? Do you? I am particularly keen to find out whether or not candy-striped spiders are there (yet)! There were records, but they turned out to be mis-IDs. This is the only province where they may not be!
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