As I was coming home the other day, I was puzzled to see what looked like mildew on the casing of my front door.  I’m not immune to such things, but there hadn’t been any in the morning, and it wasn’t a particularly humid day.  I got closer and realized that the new life forms were much higher on the evolutionary ladder.  It seems there’d been a hatch of little spiders during the day, and some had taken up residence in the space beside my storm door. I checked in with a couple of bug-savvy friends (this happens more than you’d think), and got the unanimous ID:  Araneus diadematus, the Cross orbweaver, a common late-summer garden resident.

And just so no one thinks the entomologists have hijacked the blog, the storm door in the image above is made from Spanish cedar, and the primed door casing (no, nothing on my house is ever done…) is sapele.  For scale, the door reveal is a heavy sixteenth.

Getting a little closer:

That’s a dime, again for scale, in the image below.