Waiting on a miracle

I’m on baby watch here.

Any day now, I expect there’ll be a birthing in my herb garden. Hundreds, maybe thousands, of microscopic spiderlings will chew their way out of the silken sac they’ve been snoozing in for months. Then they’ll “balloon,” sending out long silken threads on which they ride the breeze and parachute into the world.

If I’m lucky, I’ll be there to see it. One of the million tiny miracles that happen every day in the natural world…if we’re paying attention.

Last fall, the babies’ mom took up residence among the zinnias and lemon balm that bloom next to our garage. During the warm months it’s a lovely sunny spot, alive with color and fragrance. Argiope aurantia chose a pleasant place to spend her prime.

She was the so-called “zig-zag” spider, known for creating a row of Zs in her web. It’s thought that the zig-zag pattern, made from extra-thick silk and known as the stabilimentum, strengthens her web against anything larger than an insect that might get tangled in it and rip it apart. Ingenious!

Argiope immediately caught my eye with her brilliant yellow-and-black patterned abdomen. Every day I greeted her as I walked past. Her web was strung between tall stalks of lemon balm, where bees were browsing among the blooms. A perfect set-up for catching prey. She was mostly immobile, perched either out near the edge of the web or right in the middle, on top of the stabilimentum.

Her eating habits fascinated me. Here she is, wrapping up a hapless bumblebee that would become her lunch.

The day Argiope caught a beautiful swallowtail, I wasn’t at all happy with her. By the time I saw what was happening, it was too late to rescue the butterfly. It was motionless, paralyzed by spider venom and doomed. I said a little prayer. When I came back a few hours later, Argiope had consumed her prize—not a trace of it left. Quite a meal for such a little lady.

In September, as the days started to grow shorter and sunlight weaker, Argiope felt the call of her destiny. Then she did something extraordinary—not at all unusual for her or her kind, but a miracle to me.

She created an egg sac, a diminutive brown vessel shaped like a clay jar with a slender neck. It was no bigger than a grape. I spied the sac, I think, the day she made it. It clung to the garage wall next to the herb garden, about a foot away from her web. I leaned in close to admire the network of silken strands fastening it securely to the wall. An architectural marvel, if I’ve ever seen one.

As a child, I read Charlotte’s Web. Maybe you did, too. So we know what happens next. When Charlotte laid her eggs, her life force was waning. Time to say goodbye to her friend Wilbur, the pig, and young Fern, the farmer’s daughter who befriended them both. A female spider’s last act in life is to lay her eggs. Charlotte was at peace with her impending death, knowing that her legacy would live on through her children.

It wasn’t a day or more after I found the egg sac that Argiope disappeared. I looked for her body on the ground beneath her web. Nothing. She had vanished. Her short life come to an end.

Which left me as the guardian of her egg sac—or so it felt to me. I worried about the spot she had chosen. It seemed so exposed and vulnerable. What if we had freezing nights during the winter? (We did.) What if there were cold winds and icy rain? (There were.)

Then I read about how an egg sac is constructed. The spider wraps her microscopic eggs in layer after layer of silk, rolling and turning the sac with her legs as it grows bigger. The outer covering, that brown silk you see in the photo, is tougher than it looks. It’s designed to last for months, keeping the spiderlings warm and dry until they gnaw their way out in the spring.

All winter I kept an eye on the sac, fearing that a predator might discover it or harsh weather would tear it down. Nothing happened. Argiope’s eggs survived.

And today, spring is here. It’s the Vernal Equinox. Last night, the temperature dropped to 25°F. Maybe our last blast of cold. The days are already longer and warmer. I can imagine those baby spiders beginning to stir in their snug cocoon. Hearing their own call of destiny.

So I wait for the miracle.