🐜🕷️ Half Spider, Half Ant Thing 🕷️🐜

I have shared some crazy animal mimicry stuff in the past but this one is imo the craziest one by far.

Just look at this crazy half ant, half spider thing 😂

1280px-SWK12-3358_Orsima_ichneumon_male (1).jpg
source

Is it a spider? Is it an ant? And which one is the ass and which one is the head ? 😂

So, this thing is actually a jumping spider from the genus Orsima and the ant mimicry body part is the ~~ass~~ abdomen to answer the latter question.

As of today, there are three distinct species identified:

Orsima constricta found in West and Central Africa
Orsima ichneumon found in Malaysia and Indonesia (Sumatra, Borneo)
Orsima thaleri, found in Indonesia (Sumatra)

The one in the photo above belongs to the species Orsima ichneumon and is a male individual.

As for the ant mimicry, there is still no concrete answer to the purpose it serves according to the latest research I could find..Which is almost 20 years old. It could be protective, helping the spider evade predators that avoid ants. Or it could be aggressive, helping the spider to blend in with prey. Or maybe both? Maybe we will never know ^_

Here's a great close up video I found on YouTube... Damn, it just looks so weird. This one is from the species Orsima ichneumon:

And here's another one, unfortunately it's not zoomed in:

Anyways, amazing critter 😄 Just google for Orsima mimicry for some more cool photos and more info!

Ok, hope you enjoyed yet another bizarre creature with me. See you soon with more strange wonders of nature!

More Strange Animal Stuff
If you enjoyed this post here are some more amazing creatures I have recently blogged about: