Looks like you've got yourself a Phidippus Regius, AKA Regal Jumping Spider. At first I thought it was a "Red Johnson Jumper/Phidippus Johnsoni" but the pattern did not match--those spiders are typically black on the back of their head, and your beautiful spider has red on her head! It appears that you have a female of the "orange" color variety. They're gorgeous, aren't they? The brighter colors are also very common in Florida.
Jumping spiders are tricky to find. They're my favorite spider and sometimes I can't find -any- on a perfect day when I know they are out! They're fast, small, and blend in really well.
I don't know how much you know about jumpers but they are NOT dangerous to people. In fact, most will "play" with you--put out your hand and see if your spider crawls on it! They're jumpers, so they will probably get excited and jump off your hand. They spin a drag thread before they jump in case they miss, and that way can pull themselves back up without injury. They're fun to play "hand over hand" with
Typically they don't bite, unless handled roughly, squeezed, half smushed or if they feel trapped/in danger. The bite would hurt pretty good and swell a little but no worse than a bee sting, and you'd be fine.
Spiders can have incredible colors without being dangerous to people. As they're so small they're really only adapted to be dangerous to bugs. We're nearly always fine after a spider tussle.
Congrats on a gorgeous find.
Dang! I should have read the whole thread, I was looking to see if I could find it, but you already did A google image search for 'orange florida jumping spider' comes up with a photo that looks just like this little guy, and is labeled 'Regal Jumping Spider'
A couple more things that I can add to this discussion:
1) All jumping spiders belong to the salticid familiy (salticidae).
2) Something else that I learned about jumping spiders in my "Biology of Spiders" class at the University of Kansas is that they have the best visual acuity of any spider out there. Depending on the size of the spider they can see up to a foot away with the same type of image clarity as humans. They are also the only species that can move their eyes to look at something, though it is only their main pair of eyes that can do this (the priciple eyes, which are the anterior median, or the lower middle pair).
I was surprised she was able to handle such a large katydid but was soon reminded how awesome jumpers are when she started strutting around on my door with the thing dangling down from her fangs like it was nothing!
Originally Posted by shelliebear
Looks like you've got yourself a Phidippus Regius, AKA Regal Jumping Spider. At first I thought it was a "Red Johnson Jumper/Phidippus Johnsoni" but the pattern did not match--those spiders are typically black on the back of their head, and your beautiful spider has red on her head! It appears that you have a female of the "orange" color variety. They're gorgeous, aren't they? The brighter colors are also very common in Florida.
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