Hello everyone,
I was photographing a jumping spider using a studio macro rail (EPI illumination) and got interested in the scale hairs and how much detail might be seen at higher powers. This is a stacked and heavily-cropped image of the scales shot with a Mitutoyo 20x MPlan APO objective. The inset is the initial spider stack, shot with a 7.5x Mitutoyo (used to show context for the scales)
jspid-scales main-2K.jpg
Still using the macro rail, I tried a closer stack using a Nikon TU PlanAPO 50x/0.8 objective. Only 2mm working distance so lighting was a bit difficult, but it came out OK (and I got the white balance right this time). This image of the scales wasn't cropped as hard as the one above - which is why the scales don't look much bigger than the 20x version.
jspid-scales-50x-2K.jpg
I still wondered if there were even smaller features to see, so I mounted a scale on a slide and stacked it in brightfield using 365nm UV with an Olympus UPlanSApo 100/1.4 (on a microscope). There weren't a lot of new features revealed, but clarity and sharpness were definitely much better. This is a monochrome image.
one scale UV--2K.jpg
I quite like how this came out under the microscope and intend to try it with butterfly wing scales next. A couple of mounts are currently drying...
Edit: there's a 4k version of the scale image HERE (https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/54405830879_83530f6b8f_o.jpg)
Cheers
Beats
Dear Beatsy,
You have photographed the jumping spider wonderfully.
I love watching jumping spiders, I often let them run over my hand. But I've never noticed these beautiful scales before. I will use a magnifying glass in future.
Thanks for showing them.
Best regards
Herbert
Hi Beatsy,
so far, i have only heard about insect scales. Nice Pictures!
He Steve,
just WOW, especially the last image.
best
anne
Hello Steve,
I thought you would show us the result after the spider has eaten the butterfly. The scales are still all over the spider. What a mess.
Then I briefly thought, ok, he compares spider hairs with butterfly scales, why not.
Until at some point it clicked and it became ~clear that these were the spider's scales/hairs.
Is this a speciality of some/all jumping spiders and why do they have such scales? Camouflage, deception?
Are these named the "setae"?
Some claws of jumping spiders glow.
Or better said, they are iridescent.
Kind regards
Rudolf
Thanks for your comments everyone - much appreciated.
Rudolf:
Scales like these are a characteristic of most jumping spiders, but perhaps not all. I have no idea what they're for or what benifit the spider gets from them.
As I understand it, setae are "socketed hairs" as opposed to hairs that grow out of a follicle in the skin. There are 5 round sockets visible in the 50x image, in between the scales. I didn't focus-stack the full length of the hairs (or the stack would have been 5 times deeper), but you can still see a short "stump" of hair in each socket - these are setae.
The scales look like they're not in sockets though, so not setae. But I could be wrong.
Cheers
Beats