Meet the Neighbors: Apache Jumping Spider

For the introduction to this series, see here.

Here is a bright-colored jumping spider. These spiders are very beautiful and fascinating to watch but you have to creep up on them because they are very wary and agile and will disappear around the leaf or plant stem if they notice you. Jumping spiders have incredibly good eyesight for such tiny creatures. Human eyesight is only five to ten times better than a jumping spider. This is pretty amazing because the entire spider is smaller than one of our eyes! Jumping spiders have the best eyesight of any invertebrate and see the world much as we do. This is rare in the spider world. Many spiders have very poor eyesight and can only see light and shadow. Good luck stalking these brightly colored creatures! And remember that when you are looking at them, they are looking at you!