We’ve seen several variants of bird dung spiders before. They come in various colours (just like dung) and in very odd shapes (just like dung). A night shoot at Chestnut Avenue allowed us to find a crab spider masquerading as a piece of bird dung, and it had an oddly human-like face.

#1 Top view of the female Bird Dung Crab Spider (Phrynarachne sp.). Very wet and reflective, and some said the top looked like some sticky peanut snack…

#2 Face view. It is in it’s closed up position, and will remain motionless even if you touch it.

#3 Close up on the face. Ok… it wasn’t really that motionless

#4 Normal close up shot of the face

#5 3D rocking animation of the face

#6 Yet another face view, but at a slightly lower angle

#7 After leaving it alone for a while, it decided to ditch it’s shitty disguise, stand up and move around, possibly to hunt

#8 It did this whenever Melvyn moved his camera away

#9 Animation of what happened. Likely to be a threat display to warn incoming predators. But sometimes, it may do this to release some chemical to lure its prey.

#10 Became a walking piece of dung

Just for reference, here are some of the past dung spiders that I had shot before.

#11 This was shot early in the morning. The bird dung spider was busy dismantling it’s web to look like shit for the rest of the day. When night falls, it would weave it’s dangling web again. Details posted here: The Walking, Drooling Bird Dung.

#11b How the bird dung spider chews

#12 Comes in bright yellow. It is even more striking when resting on a young red leaf. Details posted here: A Beautiful Piece of Shit.

#13 One of the more common bird dung spiders. This animation shows how the pattern on it’s abdomen changes. Details posted here: What’s called a Spider and a Scorpion, but is actually neither?.

#14 A very small one, also likely to be a bird dung crab spider, guarding her egg sac. Details posted here: Ubin’s Scorpions and Many Other Critters

#15 A very dark piece of dung. Details posted here: The Huntsman Spider’s Babies

A rather short night shoot, with most of the time dedicated to a dung lookalike. But there were some other finds as well…

#16 Sleeping wasp with an incredibly thin waist. Envy of all girls…

#17 Found quite a few of these red assassin bugs on tree trunks

#18 Planthopper? Very brightly coloured.

The complete album can be viewed here.

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