northern mockingbird
On a mid-December visit to the botanical garden with a friend there were a lot of birds, all of them strategically avoiding my camera behind twigs and branches, but keeping a good eye on us.
The botanical garden had posted on its Facebook page that a yellow garden spider (aka a zipper spider) egg sac suspended between two Okefenokee hooded pitcher plants had been spotted in the Carnivorous Plant Collection – and we found it.
Inside are up to a thousand or more tiny, dormant eggs. Creating this warm silk sac was one of the last endeavors of their mother’s life – yellow garden spider adults usually don’t survive the first hard frost. If all goes well, the eggs will spend the winter safe in this sac, emerging as itsy bitsy spiderlings in spring. … This particular pitcher plant variety is native only to the Okefenokee Swamp in southeastern Georgia. (There’s also an introduced population in North Carolina.)
~ North Carolina Botanical Garden
(Facebook, December 17, 2025)
Quite impressive. Silk is very strong, but can be weakened by wetness and sunlight. Time will tell if this egg sac will make it though the winter. We’ve already had some morning temperatures in the teens.
I used to have garden spiders, but haven’t seen one is a few years. I miss them!
How very interesting! We have a type of pitcher plant in central Florida swamps. Whenever I hear the word Okefenokee, I think of Pogo comics. My whole family enjoyed them and “Pogoisms” still creep into my conversations from time to time.
It is fun seeing you play hide-n-seek with the titmouse and mockingbird!