Salticus Scenicus – Zebra Spider

Salticus Scenicus - Zebra Spider

Salticus scenicus, the zebra spider, is a jumping spider that can be found in the entire Northern Hemisphere. As its common name suggests, the zebra spider can be identified by its black and white colored abdomen.

Description of the zebra spider

Zebra spiders are black with sections of tiny white hairs giving them the look of white stripes. They can sometimes look brown with white stripes. The abdomen is slightly larger than the cephalothorax.

Salticus Scenicus - Zebra Jumping Spider
Photography by: K. J. Ester – Madison Heights, Michigan

The legs are short for spiders. They have eight eyes. Four across the front and two along each side, near the top. The two middle eyes in the front are much larger.

Size

The Zebra Jumping Spider will grow to about 1/4 inch (6 mm).

Web

The zebra spider is a hunter spider and does not build a web to catch prey. This is true for any hunting spider.

Salticus scenicus Scientific Classification

  • Kingdom: Animalia
  • Phylum: Arthropoda
  • Subphylum: Chelicerata
  • Class: Arachnida
  • Order: Araneae
  • Infraorder: Araneomorphae
  • Family: Salticidae
  • Genus: Salticus
  • Species: Salticus scenicus

Distribution of zebra spiders in the USA

Zebra jumping spider salticus scenicus range United States

The zebra spider appears throughout the entire Northern Hemisphere and in every US state: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming

Salticus Scenicus – Zebra Spider

7 thoughts on “Salticus Scenicus – Zebra Spider

  1. So cute! There’s one of these in my bathroom, and it seems relatively unafraid! Climbed readily onto my finger and rested there for a while.

  2. There was a Zebra Jumping spider in our backyard on my Italian cedar. Its stripes were clearly visible and was jumping from branch to branch.

  3. as a child I would feed them small insects I captured in the garden it seemed they would become tam, and they would readily run up to me when I’d sit by the windowsills…..Drove my mother insane.

  4. This spider I found in Joseph Oregon I think it might of been a jumping spider because it moved like one and kept turning to watch me

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