The alligator is back

Sunday, 7 April, 2013

I went out on the bike for 40 miles, 2400 vertical feet. Everyone in the world was out enjoying the day. Nice.

Normally, the back deck is full of tiny spiders, busy going about their business. When an alligator lizard took up residence under the deck, a year or two ago, the spider population plummeted! Then I didn’t see the lizard for quite a while, and the spiders began to recover.

Over the last week or three, I see fewer spiders than I would expect, and today, I see why.

Not only is there one alligator lizard, but there are at least two. I saw what I think was a third, same colour as the one above, but much shorter tail. Raising a family, are they! Too bad about the spiders.

I conjectured that the lizards had taken up summer residence from their haunt in the firewood pile. So I went over to the firewood, which is busy, busy, busy, with hundreds of wolf spiders, many of them carrying egg pouches.

It will be interesting to watch the balance of forces here.

Tags: Alligator lizard, Wolf spider