Image 1
Details of the exterior view of the carapace exoskeleton or, the former external face and eye surfaces. There is no spider here, just the remains of its former exoskeleton, hairs and eye surfaces included. Note the quantity of plumose hairs on this species.
Olympus 10x S Plan Achromat, 192 images at 5 micron increments.
Image 2
A wider view of the exterior side of the carapace molt shell.
Leitz 4x Plan Fluorite, 50 images at .002 inch increments.
Image 3
Details of the interior view of the carapace molt shell or, the former inside surface that was in contact with the now fresh new exoskeleton. Note that some of the new plumose hairs have remained stuck and were lost to the old exoskeleton surface. The former eye surfaces are concave.
Olympus 10x S Plan Achromat, 142 images at 5 micron increments.
Image 4
Again, a wider view of the interior side of the carapace molt shell. Please note that the oval pattern below the eyes is a small application of petroleum jelly used to hold and position the delicate carapace mold. You are seeing it through the semitransparent exoskeleton material.
Leitz 4x Plan Fluorite, 50 images at .002 inch increments.
Image 5
An additional single frame view of the inside surface showing how thin the casting of the carapace is.
Leitz 4x Plan Fluorite 1 image.
All images made with reflected diffused fiber-optic illumination.
Leitz Ortholux microscope
4X Leitz projection eyepiece plus 1/3x relay lens
Canon 50D
Zerene PMax stacking.
Processing in Photoshop, Bibble Pro5
Thank you for looking at these strange images. I have always been fascinated by the fact that a spider can shed its outer surface several times in its lifetime in order to grow and even sexually mature. Little did I realize how extensive this exchange to a new surface would be. I start with the carapace because it reminds me so much of a death mask, recording every feature of the spider’s former “face”.
The carapace mold that these images show appears to be the only part of the exoskeleton that this spider sheds as a separate, intact piece. In its whole, not present in these images, it resembles the glass canopy of a jet fighter that the pilot would jettison before launching the ejector seat. The eye side is the part of this piece that I show in detail here.
I had at one time, expected there to be eight holes were it covered the eyes. However, as you can see, the eye surfaces are being shed with the rest of the exoskeleton. A good reference image to this is image #1 from Spiders No. 36 were the uniformity of the eyes is unbroken with respect to the surrounding surface.
I was able to obtain these images and those of the next installment due to a bit of luck for me but a tragedy for the spider involved. It died for some reason as it was extracting itself from its old exoskeleton. Only its abdomen remained in the former material when it expired. It was one of my terrarium subjects so the extremely delicate shell remained in very good condition.
If you are interested I would like your opinions on the following:
In image #1, look carefully at the large articulated hairs, like the single one and then the pair below and dead center between the set of four eyes. Then find their location on the underside image #3. In Image #3, it appears to me that there are openings in the center of the round surface depression. This indicates to me that the hairs were pulled free, leaving a hollow tapered core. Or in other words, the original hair is retained with the molt built around it. Either that or they have snapped off and will be re-grown.
What do you think?
Walt
