The cross spider is a representative of the most common species, which is found in almost all regions except northern and southern latitudes. It prefers places with high humidity and is most often found in gardens, fields, among shrubs growing near water bodies, as well as in groves and forests. It can also live on the eaves of buildings and on the facades of buildings.
Description of appearance
You can meet the cross in the forest, garden, field, in the yard among outbuildings. The spider loves a quiet place, protected from sunlight. During the day it sits motionless on the web or hides in a secluded place.
The size of females is no more than 1 cm, males are always smaller. The body is painted in brown and gray tones of different shades.
On a note!
On the abdomen there is a pattern in the form of a cross of white, yellow, orange spots and stripes. For this reason, the spider got its name.
The legs are long, powerful, attached to the cephalothorax. The number of legs, like all types of spiders, is 8. The abdomen is convex, oval in shape. In front of the head are strong chelicerae and pedipalps. With chelicerae, the predator kills the prey, inflicts bites, and injects poison. Pedipalps are movable tentacles. With them the spider grinds, crushes, grinds food, and holds prey.
Crossworts belong to the orb weaver family. They build trapping nets, wait for prey, sitting on the web or hanging in close proximity. You can often find a spider in the center of your creation in an "X" pose. It weaves threads around plants, grass, branches of trees, shrubs, and leaves.
Spider structure
The size of cross spiders depends on gender. On average, the male reaches up to 1.0 cm, and the female up to 2.0 cm. In some species, the length of female specimens reaches 2.6 cm. Arachnologists study the body parts of the cross spider with great interest.
External
The number of legs intended for walking in the cross spider is 8 pieces. In addition, it has 1 pair of pedipalps, which are responsible for recognizing and holding the victim. And also 1 pair of chelicerae (jaws). The spider uses them to attack and kill its prey. The oral appendages of arthropods point downward, and their hooks point inward.
The eyes (4 pairs) of the arthropod do not serve their purpose well. They allow you to see only blurry silhouettes, a flash of light or a shadow. But this disadvantage is compensated by a well-developed sense of touch. The entire surface of the spiders' body is covered with a large number of tactile hairs. They perceive chemical and sound stimuli, and also react to air currents.
The posterior part of the body is rounded and not divided into segments. On its lower part there are 3 pairs of warts with a large number of glands. They are necessary for the cross to produce a variety of threads that help it in various situations. With their help, they weave webs, make cocoons or arrange shelters.
Internal
The internal structure of the spider is also of great interest. Not all of his organs are located on his abdomen.
Digestion
Crosses have external digestion. They are unable to swallow whole food and then digest it. They are forced to build nets to catch prey. When the prey is in the web, the spider injects it with a special juice necessary for fermentation, wraps it in a cocoon, and then waits for the prey to digest and become a nutrient solution that the arthropod drinks.
Respiratory system
The spider's abdomen contains organs of the respiratory system. They are a pair of pulmonary sacs with a large number of leaf-like folds, as well as 2 bundles of tracheal tubes. They are filled with air and hemolymph (a biological fluid similar to blood that fills the spider’s vessels) flows through them to enrich them with oxygen.
The cardiovascular system
The Crusaders have an open circulatory system. The dorsal part of the abdomen contains the heart. Its appearance resembles a long tube with large blood vessels branching off. The anterior aorta, which branches into arteries, is connected to the anterior end of the heart.
From the terminal arterial branches, hemolymph enters the body of the crusader spider. While washing the internal organs, it supplies them with oxygen and nutrients. Gas exchange occurs when hemolymph flows through the pulmonary sacs. The hemolymph contains a blue pigment that contains copper.
Excretory system
In the cross spider, the excretory system is represented by coxal glands and malpighian vessels in the form of tubes. The latter are circular protrusions of the intestinal wall. They are localized between the midgut and hindgut, and allow waste products to be absorbed from the body cavity of the arthropod.
The coxal glands, in the form of two sacs, are located on the fused head and thoracic segments. They diverge into a system of canals that end in excretory ducts at the base of the legs intended for walking.
Lifestyle, behavior
Predators live alone, gathering in pairs for a very short time - during the mating season. The males crawl up to the female’s web and carefully move the threads. A hungry spider can easily eat a gentleman before he even begins courtship. If the chosen one remains in the center of the web, sits motionless, you can approach her.
On a note!
After mating, the female forms a cocoon and lays up to 500 eggs in it. It stays close to its shelter and protects it. After birth, the spiders crawl in different directions. The mating period occurs at the end of July, by the beginning of autumn the young generation appears. They overwinter in the forest floor, under bark, and tree hollows.
Crossbills feed on insects. Their trapping nets catch butterflies, flies, grasshoppers, crickets, wasps, bees, fruit flies, and mosquitoes. The spider pierces the chitinous cover, injects poison and saliva. The toxic substance causes muscle paralysis and immobilizes the victim. The mica turns the insides into a liquid mass, which the predator then drinks.
Range and habitats
Crossworts are found throughout the globe in temperate or tropical climates. Some species of such arthropods live in Europe, Asia, Africa, and also in North America. In their first year, spiders overwinter in the egg stage.
The habitat of the cross spider is damp, low-lying places, in the vicinity of which there are bodies of water. They also like forests, parks or gardens, where it is convenient to weave catching nets between the branches.
Sometimes a round web of crosses is found in window and door openings, as well as under the roofs of abandoned buildings.
Poisonous or not
For insects, the dose of poison is lethal. If a small rodent is repeatedly bitten by a spider, death can also occur. A dose of a toxic substance for large animals or humans does not pose a danger to life, but a local reaction appears at the site of the bite, and in some people their general well-being worsens.
Crosses are not aggressive and do not attack people. They try to hide unnoticed in a secluded place. The bite occurs accidentally. A spider can crawl under clothes and hide in things that have been in nature. Often gets into shoes at night. Bites only in self-defense. If you don't touch the cross, no one will get hurt.
Prevention
Chilly cross spider
The easiest way to avoid being bitten is to not try to catch a spider with your bare hands. The arthropod is very timid and, when a person approaches, makes every effort to hide and not give away its presence.
A spider can bite only when it is driven into a corner and has no choice but to defend itself. In extremely rare cases, an individual may be accidentally crushed and then a bite may occur, but usually they do not approach close to a person. The table and video provide instructions on how to protect yourself from bites of all types of spiders.
Table. Precautionary measures:
| What do we have to do | A comment |
| To prevent dangerous arthropods from entering your home, you should install mosquito nets on the windows, close the doors in country and rural houses, as well as the entrance to the tent if you are outdoors. |
| When you are in natural landscapes, try to inspect shoes and shirts before putting them on. Before going to bed, check that there are no uninvited guests in your overnight stay. |
| If you notice a regularly shaped round web stretched between branches or on the veranda, this means that there is a cross spider nearby; as a rule, it will be a large female in ambush. |
| While in the country, in the village, in the meadow or in the forest, carefully watch what you pick up. There is a possibility of pinning down an undetected animal and getting bitten. |
| The most important recommendation is that you do not need to catch or stroke the spider, as it will evaluate this as an act of aggression and may attack. |
Important. More often, crosses bite children, because it is quite difficult for them to bite through the skin of an adult. In addition, it is children who show extreme curiosity about all types of animals, so it is important to monitor the little ones and teach older ones that touching a spider is dangerous.
Bite symptoms
The small spider may not be noticed, but the bite is felt immediately. Severe pain occurs. Further, the clinical picture develops differently, depending on the amount of poison ingested, the strength of the victim’s immunity, and the tendency to an allergic reaction.
Frequent symptoms:
- pain;
- redness;
- edema;
- swelling;
- two spots of dried blood located in close proximity.
A photo of the aftermath of a crusader bite is presented below.
If the wound is not properly treated after a spider attack, suppuration appears as a result of a secondary infection. The sore spot swells, hurts, and the scale of inflammation increases. A complicated spider bite in the photo below.
On a note!
In people prone to allergies, with weakened immune systems, and young children, their general health worsens. This is due to the poison entering the general bloodstream and an inadequate reaction of the immune system.
Allergy to the bite of the cross spider
Appears:
- nausea;
- weakness;
- headache;
- dizziness;
- diarrhea;
- temperature rises;
- blood pressure increases;
- heart rate increases.
The condition normalizes on its own or requires special treatment. A spider bite will go away within a week with the right approach.
Important!
There are no problems with breathing from the poison, but if this happens, you should immediately call an ambulance. The toxic substance causes muscle spasms, and the cardiac and respiratory systems suffer. With a minimal dose of poison and strong immunity, such a reaction does not develop.
What does the cross spider eat?
The cross spider has a varied diet:
- fruit flies;
- any dipterous insects;
- wasps, bees, ants;
- grasshoppers;
- aphidids;
- other small insects.
To get its food, the cross is forced to build a web to catch prey. When a victim falls into the net, the spiders do not eat the food immediately, but wrap it in a cocoon and hide it. This is necessary so that the fermentation process takes place, and also so that other relatives do not covet the prey.
Enemies in nature and human contact
Since the spider weaves its web at night, the chance of bumping into birds or those who might feast on it is minimal. However, there is an even greater danger posed by larger insects. So flies and wasps can fly up to a spider frozen in anticipation of prey, and lay their eggs in its body.
Cross spiders live all over the world, except in the most northern and southern latitudes.
Since ancient times, people have tried to come up with a use for the spider's web. And items of jewelry, clothing, and much more were made from spider webs. But this did not work out as a large-scale project, since it would have been necessary to build entire spider farms, and this is not a very profitable business. But spider web has found its application in various optical devices that require thin fibers. Microbiologists have found a use for cobwebs by adding them to an air analyzer.
It has also been scientifically proven that spider webs can kill millions of bacteria without harming animal cells, so they can be used as an antibacterial and wound disinfectant.
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Lifestyle
The natural habitats of crusader spiders are their natural environment, but they can often be found in human homes. They show their main activity at night, and during the day they prefer to hide in their shelters. Therefore, the spider weaves its web at night. Being in the natural environment, the spider builds itself a house from leaves, and weaves a web in the spaces between the trees.
The web of the cross is a rather complex engineering structure, consisting of 39 radii of various sizes, 35 spiral turns, as well as 1245 points of contact of the threads. As mentioned above, some species can weave webs up to 2 meters in diameter.
Interesting fact! The spider weaves a web at night, and during the day it works, that is, the victim gets caught in it. If the web is damaged, the spider repairs it or weaves a new one. The diet of birds also includes spiders, but at night the birds rest, so the spiders go out hunting.
Experts say that spiders can live for about 2 years, although in the natural environment rarely do any spiders manage to live even 2 years due to the presence of natural enemies. In home conditions close to natural conditions, the spider can easily live up to 2 years.
