Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 2 (1898).djvu/450

418 The nest itself is composed of a compact mass of closely felted glutinous silk traversed irregularly throughout with tubular passages, sometimes terminating in small chambers. In these latter the egg cocoons are often placed, but by no means always, for there seems to be no organised nursery, as with the social Hymenoptera. The surrounding foliage is worked in with the nest (but I doubt whether this is for protective purposes), the exterior being overlaid with a coating of very adhesive silk, which is likewise used for making the snares, these being highly irregular both in size and shape, but usually taking the form of vertical screens.

I may here digress to express my belief that the nests of some of our Sunbirds, viz. Cinnyris gutturalis, L., C. chalybæus, L., Anthodiæta collaris, V., &c, are built expressly to resemble the nests of Stegodyphus for protective purposes. I have watched the construction in the case of these three species, and the nests are all built in a practically similar manner. No attempt is made at concealment, and they hang suspended from the outermost twigs of bushes or low trees at no great distance from the ground—positions which are equally affected by the Social Spider. The ground work of the dome-shaped nest with its small porch is composed of interwoven grass, and the exterior is covered with leaves, twigs, &c, bound on with cobwebs, the structure when finished having a generally unkempt appearance eminently suggestive of the abode of Stegodyphus; and indeed I have been deceived myself in this respect more than once. I have observed A. collaris and C. chalybæus collecting web from the snares of the large Nephile Spiders in Natal; but a pair of C. gutturalis, which built within a few feet of the door of one of my huts on the Umfali river, used only the web of Stegodyphus.

The food of the Social Spiders consists principally of Coleoptera, for the capture of which their strong glutinous snares are admirably adapted. Their chief victims are the Melolonthidse, such as Anomala, Trochalus, Adoretus, &c, which positively swarm round trees and bushes on the warm spring evenings after the early rains. Among the larger diurnal beetles, the handsome Buprestids of the genus Psiloptera fall a frequent prey to their wiles, and it seems strange how such securely armour-plated insects can afford sustenance to the weak little Spiders; especially