After I had
hiked out and back on the Dike Trail at Back Bay NWR, I walked the Bay Trail (which is mostly boardwalk) behind the visitor center and parking lot. Along one section of the Bay Trail I noticed lots of large grasshoppers on either side of the boardwalk. As I walked along they would occasionally spook and propel themselves to some more comfortable resting spot. The first photo below is a photograph I got of one that decided not to vacate its current resting spot as I walked by.
Then I got to this sunny spot where a very large spider web was in the foliage on the left side of the boardwalk. Right in the middle of the web was a large black spider with a yellow pattern on his body (I think it is a
Black and Yellow Argiope, also known as a Yellow Garden Spider or Yellow Garden Orbweaver). And the spider was occupied with a large meal. Caught in the spider's trap was one of those grasshoppers, its spindly legs clearly showing under the spider's binding silk.
