Abstract
The species composition and habitat associations of spiders were studied in one abandoned and 5 commercial apple orchards in central Virginia. Sixty-eight identifiable species were recorded from all orchards. The abandoned orchard contained 63 species while 11–17 species were found in individual commercial orchards. The Salticidae, Philodromidae, Thomisidae, Theridiidae, Anyphaenidae, and Dictynidae comprised 75–92% of the total spiders collected from each orchard. The proportions of hunting spiders found in all but one commercial orchard were similar to that found in the abandoned orchard. The many species of spiders encountered in each orchard exhibited specific habitat preferences and segregated the tree into numerous niches. Since many orchard insect pests often occupy several of these niches, different spider species may act in a complementary manner to suppress such insect pest populations.
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