The female small black spider has a bad reputation and there are various rumors about her. Here are some of them: she is capable of inflicting a fatal bite on a person, for lunch she eats her husband as the main course.
Unfortunately, these stories are more or less true. Black spiders are distributed throughout the world. Of course, there's little chance that a black spider will make a nest in your home, but what if... There's something to see here: it's a shiny black spider with a red, yellow or orange pattern on its abdomen, often in the shape of a watch glass.
How does reproduction occur in spiders?
The copulatory organs are formed on the male's pedipalps only during the last molt. Before mating, the male secretes a drop of sperm from the genital opening onto a specially woven arachnoid mesh, fills the copulatory organs of the pedipalps with sperm, and during mating, with their help, introduces sperm into the seminal receptacles of the female.
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Differences between male and female black widows
Female and male black widow
Until the beginning of the 20th century, this small black spider was called differently everywhere: a watchmaker spider, a shoe clasp, a poisonous woman. At the beginning of our century, it finally received a name - the black widow. In the black widow spider, the females and males look completely different, so you can tell the difference between the behavior of the female and understand why she has such a reputation. The male is dark brown rather than black. There are white stripes on the sides of the abdomen. The pattern on the abdomen is dull, poorly defined and usually has no definite shape. An adult male has practically no poison or very little of it; it cannot even reliably paralyze an insect.
The female black widow, on the contrary, has a beautiful pattern on her abdomen, and her poison glands are in full working order - working great. The venom released in drops is stronger than that of a rattlesnake. Compared to her husband, the female looks simply monumental: she is two to three times larger than the male.
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Black widow eats prey
Fun fact: The venom of a female black widow is more deadly than that of a rattlesnake.
What does the black widow spider eat?
A venomous black widow spider wraps its web around a helpless fly before eating its prey. (Image credit: Stephen Love/Alamy Stock Photo)
Like many spiders, black widows eat other spiders and insects that get caught in their webs. But despite their reputation as cannibals, females generally do not eat other females of their species. ()
The only known black widow species in which mating cannibalism is the rule rather than the exception in nature are found in the Southern Hemisphere, and most male black widows survive to mate another day. However, newborn black widows often eat their newly hatched siblings when they hatch from their eggs. ()
Black widows primarily eat flying and climbing insects and arachnids, but they are also known to catch and eat small vertebrates such as snakes and lizards. Once prey becomes entangled in a black widow's web, the spider paralyzes it with a venomous bite. After the prey stops moving, the spider secretes digestive enzymes into its body and then takes away the food to eat. (, )
Black widow nutrition
The diet is not much different from the menu of all other arachnids. It mainly includes insects that, through their carelessness, fall into the web. Their favorite treats are flies, midges, mosquitoes, beetles and caterpillars.
It is interesting to watch how the spider treats its prey. The spider understands that the “food” is already in place by the vibration of the webs. He gets closer to his victim and envelops him with his hind legs so that he is simply unable to escape.
The widow has special fangs, with the help of which the spider injects its victim with a special liquid that liquefies all its flesh. This causes the victim to die. Another feature of the black widow is that it can limit itself in food for a long time. Spiders can live from hand to mouth for about a year.
Black widow bite
Are you afraid of spiders?
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A spider can only bite in self-defense. When bitten, a small dose of venom enters the bloodstream and in rare cases can be fatal. Bites are dangerous for children, the elderly, and people with weak immune systems.
The bite is not painful. You may not notice it right away. The first symptom is redness and slight numbness at the site of the bite.
If detected, measures are immediately taken to remove toxins from the body. The poison consists of alpha-latrotoxin, adenosine, guanosine, ionisine.
Within 15 minutes a person begins to feel the effects of the bite. Symptoms of damage are:
- muscle contraction;
- presence of two wounds;
- headache;
- nausea;
- dizziness;
- severe abdominal pain;
- labored breathing;
- spasm;
- joint pain;
- elevated temperature.
After 7-14 days, the pain decreases, but shortness of breath and dizziness may remain for another 6 months. Only a bite from an adult black widow can lead to death. If the victim is at risk, he must be monitored. However, it is better not to take risks and take decisive action. Some tips:
- apply a cold compress or ice to the wound;
- ensure immobility of the victim;
- call an ambulance.
In hospitals, spider bites are treated with an intravenous drip containing calcium gluconate and muscle relaxants. In especially severe cases, a special serum is needed. It is strictly forbidden to drink alcohol so that toxic toxins do not increase their effects.
The danger of a black widow to humans
Despite their terrifying appearance, black widow spiders are quite shy. But people are wary of them not without reason: the poison with which the black widow paralyzes insects is also harmful to humans. There are many stories about people being bitten by female black widows. In 1933, one scientist described his condition after being bitten on the finger by a black widow: the pain quickly spread up the arm, then moved to the chest, he felt drowsiness and headache, and his pulse slowed. Soon he could no longer write on his own and his assistant continued the recordings. Then the pain spread to the stomach, a slight trembling appeared in the muscles of the legs, and the scientist was taken to the hospital. There appeared a speech disorder, and then a breathing disorder. He survived, but recovery took eight days.
In what cases will the male be eaten?
Black Widow
Male black widows are not the only ones whose mating is a very dangerous field. For example, female praying mantises simply bite off their spouses' heads after their wedding night. The male black widow becomes just as dangerous when mating season arrives. Having found the female hanging in the web, the male “knocks” on her door, making oscillatory movements with his abdomen and thereby causing the web to vibrate. If a similar vibration is produced in response, everything is in order, and perhaps the spider will remain alive - the female is ready to accept the groom. But if not... The female in this case pounces on the male, bites him and wraps him in a cocoon of cobwebs to eat when she is hungry.
Fun fact: The female black widow often has an orange watch glass pattern on her abdomen.
If the female is ready for mating games, then everything usually ends well. The only trouble is that if the female suddenly gets hungry after the wedding night, she will eat her betrothed without hesitation. Well, if she is full, then the lucky one, one might say, is lucky: he is released on all four sides.
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New weirdness of spider love
Recently, Uruguayan zoologists discovered interesting spiders, the males of which are much larger and more aggressive than the females. Interestingly, unlike the classic situation in which the spider eats her husband after mating, in these animals the opposite happens. A male can eat a female he doesn’t like, not after mating, but during the process.
This "wrong" spider, Allocosa brasiliensis, lives in South America, right on the border of Brazil and Uruguay. It belongs to the ecological group of wolf spiders, which do not weave trapping webs, but hunt insects from ambush or chase down prey. These ruthless hunters are active at night, and during the day they hide in earthen burrows located at the roots of bushes or among turf. Moreover, the male's burrow is always larger and more noticeable than that of the female.
In representatives of this species, everything is arranged differently from typical spiders. First, the male Allocosa brasiliensis is larger and more aggressive than the female. Secondly, during reproduction, it is not he who comes to the burrow of his chosen one: on the contrary, the spider herself comes to visit him. In addition, males can fertilize several females, but spiders usually visit only one gentleman each season.
Dr. Anita Eisenberg, who leads a group of arachnologists studying the behavior of Allocosa brasiliensis, believes that it all depends on the conditions in which this species of spider lives.
However, the situation when the male is larger than the female in spiders can be considered unique. There are several cases where spiders are the same size as their suitors, although usually the female is still several times larger than her suitors. By the way, contrary to the widespread stereotype, she does not always eat the male after mating.
In another cross spider, Araneus marmoreus, the male often escapes from the deadly jaws of his girlfriend by jumping onto her back after copulation and sitting there for some time. And male nurse spiders (Pisaura mirabilis) are often saved by giving gifts to their chosen ones. Before mating, they bring the spiders a dead insect wrapped in a web. Having presented a gift, gentlemen often immediately pretend to be dead and fall at the feet of the spider.
However, some males of Pisaura mirabilis deceive their female friends by bringing them in a package not an insect, but a tightly packed sliver or pebble. Interestingly, they often manage to escape alive and unharmed. It turns out that deception is sometimes evolutionarily beneficial for procreation.
Male tarantula spiders almost always leave the scene of a “love battle” alive and healthy. At the same time, during mating, some stroke the female with their pedipalps along the “erogenous zones” on the front legs, putting them in a state close to a trance. In order to come to their senses after this, they need about half a minute. During this time, the male always manages to escape. Some of the male tarantulas, whose girlfriends live in earthen burrows, lure her out by tapping her paws on the threshold, and when she just sticks out of the burrow, they immediately begin fertilization, and they do it with lightning speed. So when the spider fully appears on the surface, the male manages to run away to a safe distance.
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Description of the black widow
Name: Black widow Lat.:
Latrodectus mactansClass: Arachnida - Arachnida Order: Spiders - Araneae Family: Shadowcats - Theridiidae
| Habitats: | dark corners, crevices |
| Dangerous for: | flies, mosquitoes |
| Attitude towards people: | harmless, do not harm |
The black widow is a spider with a certain reputation. She is always alone in the construction and offspring.
Females are dark brown or shiny black in color. The adult has an orange or reddish hourglass on the lower abdomen. Some species have only a couple of red spots, while others are completely absent. Occasionally there are representatives of pale brown color.
Males have red, yellow, and white markings on the upper side of the abdomen. They are smaller than females. The average size is from 3 to 10 mm. The largest females reach 13 mm. The limbs of an arthropod significantly exceed the size of the body. In comparison, men have a smaller abdomen and longer legs.
Life cycle
Spider with cocoons.
Mating occurs in spring and summer. The female is laying eggs. Usually it is 200 eggs. The females cover them with cobwebs, forming a protective sac. They hang it on a web to protect it from predators.
After 14 days, spiderlings appear. Several molts occur during the arachnid's maturation. Nutrition and temperature influence the formation of spiders.
Spiders mature within 2-4 months. The lifespan of females is from one to two years, and that of males is no more than 4 months. Many die before they reach full adulthood. Even representatives of the same offspring often eat each other when close to the mother.
What does a black widow spider look like?
As is the case with many species of spiders, male and female black widows are very different from each other. Of all black widow species, "the females are the most distinctive, with shiny black bodies and a red hourglass-shaped mark on the underside of their round abdomen." The hourglass markings on females may also be orange-yellow.
By comparison, males are lighter in color with a smaller abdomen, which may have red or pink markings, according to the University of California Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources (UCDANR). Female black widows have a body length of up to 13 millimeters, and males are usually about half the size of females. ()
Black Widow: Four women whose marriage led to the grave
Popularly called “black widows” are women whose husbands, for some reason, do not live long. Sometimes it is a chain of tragic accidents. But not always.
Vera Renzi
Vera was born in 1903 into a wealthy family descended from the Hungarian nobility, but neither money nor noble origins seem to have left any mark on the character of this young lady. According to some sources, Vera grew up as a completely uncontrollable child and already at the age of fifteen she ran away from home in the company of friends. Vera preferred to be friends with men, and chose those who were much older than her. She also married an older man.
He was a wealthy businessman from Bucharest, from whom Vera gave birth to a son, Lorenzo. Soon after the birth of the child, Vera began to suspect that her husband was cheating on her and decided to take revenge. She slipped arsenic into her husband's wine. After getting rid of the body, Vera told her relatives that her husband left her and her son and went to another woman. A year later, she announced that she had heard rumors about the death of her unfaithful husband in a car accident. Soon she married again.
Vera's second husband was her age, but this marriage did not work out either: Vera again began to torment her husband with her jealousy and suspicion, and the couple often quarreled. Soon the black widow’s second husband also disappeared - according to Vera, and he also preferred someone else to her. A year later, she allegedly received a letter from him in which he said that he was breaking up with her forever and would not return home. In fact, the body of the “unfaithful husband” had been lying in a coffin in a wine cellar for a year.
Vera never married again, but she had relationships with different men, including married ones. All her lovers disappeared without a trace - some a year after the start of the novel, and some literally in the first days. It is believed that the series of murders was stopped by the deceived wife of one of Vera’s lovers: the woman allegedly decided to follow her unfaithful husband and found out who he was visiting, and when the man disappeared, she called the police.
Renzi's house was searched and 32 zinc coffins with bodies of varying degrees of decomposition were found in the basement. Vera confessed to the murders and said that she poisoned all these men with arsenic because they were unfaithful to her. She also stated that she enjoyed spending time in the basement "with former fans." She also confessed to the murders of both husbands. In addition, it turned out that Vera’s son, who came to visit her, accidentally discovered a basement with coffins, then Vera poisoned him too.
Belle Sorensen Gunness
According to some sources, Belle Sorensen Gunness (née Brunnhilde Polsdatter Storschett) sent 25 to 40 people to the next world, including her own daughters Myrtle and Lucy and, possibly, both husbands, as well as all her other children.
Brunnhilde, aka Belle, was born in Norway. She was the youngest of 8 children, but she grew up to be a large and strong girl: according to eyewitnesses, Brünnhilde was 183 centimeters tall and weighed 90 kilograms; she was very strong. The girl was hired to work on farms and in three years managed to save up money for a ticket to the USA, where one of her older sisters had already gone. Overseas, Brünnhilde changed her name and got a job as a servant.
In 1884, Belle married Mads Sorensen from Chicago, and a year later they opened their own candy store there, but it burned down a year later. The couple took out the insurance and bought a house with the money.
According to research, Belle and Meds had four children: Caroline, Axel, Myrtle and Lucy. Caroline and Axel died in infancy, allegedly from colitis, the symptoms of which are almost no different from the symptoms of poisoning: diarrhea, nausea, cramps. The children were insured, and after their death the insurance company paid the parents money. Belle then poisoned her husband too. The proceeds were enough for her to buy herself a farm.
It was to this farm that Belle began inviting men by placing marriage advertisements in newspapers. There were plenty of people who wanted to create the personal happiness of a wealthy widow, but not one of them became Belle’s husband or returned from the damned farm. What happened to Belle's other children is unknown.
Moreover, it is unknown how the poisoner herself died: at some point she simply disappeared, and soon after her disappearance the police discovered a headless and charred corpse near Belle’s farm. The identity of these remains as belonging to the criminal remains unproven today, so perhaps the black widow simply faked her death to avoid punishment.
Mary Ann Cotton
It is said that the executioner who executed Mary Ann Cotton deliberately prolonged the victim's torment by improperly securing the noose. If this is true, there was a reason: Mary Ann Cotton poisoned about 20 people with arsenic, including ten of her own children, four husbands and a lover.
Mary Ann's childhood was difficult: her father was very religious and often punished his children. After his death, Mary Ann's family, consisting of her mother and brother, found herself below the poverty line. In Victorian England, this meant that the family would have to go into “workhouses” and separate, but the girl’s mother remarried. Hunger and separation no longer threatened the family, but Mary Ann’s relationship with her stepfather did not work out: they mutually disliked each other, and the girl looked for any opportunity to leave her father’s house.
At the age of 16, Mary Ann got a job as a farm worker. The owners had no complaints about her work, but almost immediately rumors began to spread about her sexual adventures. However, Mary Ann soon married a miner named William Mowbray and left. This marriage produced five children, but four died in infancy. Soon the husband also died: he was injured at work and went home to receive treatment, but there he was struck down by an intestinal disorder, from which the unfortunate man died.
After receiving the insurance, Mary Ann bought herself a new dress. She sent her only surviving daughter, Isabel, to her grandmother, and she herself found work in a hospital, becoming responsible for storing arsenic.
At the hospital, Mary Ann began an affair with a patient, an engineer named George Ward. Soon after his discharge, they got married, but Mary Ann was in no hurry to take Isabelle to a new family, especially since her new husband fell ill again. The doctor who saw George accused the hospital of mistreating the patient, and Mary Ann actively supported this point of view. Soon after, George Ward died and Mary Ann moved out.
Mary Ann's next husband, James Robinson, was looking for a housewife to take care of his home and children after his wife's death. Mary Ann easily passed the interview and was hired. Just a month later, around Christmas, one of Robinson’s children fell ill with enteric fever and died. Mary Ann hastened to console her unhappy father, and soon she was already pregnant with his child.
At this time, her mother became seriously ill, and Mary Ann went to care for her and at the same time visit Isabel. By the time her daughter arrived, Mary Ann’s mother was already recovering, but then she suddenly became worse and died, also from an intestinal disorder. Isabel had to go with her mother to Robinson's house, where she soon fell ill - along with James's three children. They all died one after another. Surviving is the daughter of Mary Ann and James Robinson, an infant.
James himself was saved from death by his own stinginess: it turned out that Mary Ann had incurred debts without his knowledge, and Robinson, in a rage, kicked his wife out of the house. She left with her little daughter, whom she then dropped off with friends. The child was returned to his father.
Mary Ann herself quickly met another widower, Frederick Cotton, and quickly became pregnant by him. Frederick proposed marriage to her, Mary Ann accepted, although she was still officially married to Robinson. A year later, Frederick Cotton died from the same mysterious intestinal disease, and Mary Ann became the owner of his house and guardian of his two sons.
She invited her lover to this house, but could not live with him for long: very close by there was an elderly and wealthy official who needed a nurse. Mary Ann, without changing her usual plan, became pregnant by an elderly rich man, but Cotton’s children interfered with this marriage. She immediately poisoned Cotton's two children (one of whom was her own), as well as her own lover. Only seven-year-old Charles Cotton remained alive.
Mary Ann, confident in her own impunity, sent a future victim to get the poison, but they did not sell the arsenic to Charles. Then she asked a neighbor about it, he did not refuse, and soon Charles Cotton died. The doctors, who had recently examined the boy and found no signs of illness, were amazed. In addition, Mary Ann's neighbors were shocked by the fact that after the death of her stepson, she did not go to the morgue to collect his body, but to the insurance company for money.
Local newspapers latched on to this story, and Mary Ann prepared to escape, but did not have time: the doctor who preserved Charles Cotton’s tissues conducted an examination and discovered arsenic in them. The police arrested Mary Ann, the bodies of her victims were exhumed, and evidence was collected. Mary Ann Cotton was sentenced to death. On March 24, 1873, she ascended the scaffold and, due to an incorrectly made noose by the executioner, died for about three minutes.
Lydia Sherman
Lydia Shermann or, as she was also called, Borgia from Connecticut lived with her husband in love and harmony for 18 years and only then poisoned him.
At the age of 16, Lydia met widower Edward Strack and almost immediately married him: the girl grew up without parents and dreamed of a family. Strack was a police officer, and after 18 years of excellent service, he was laid off. He fell into depression, which greatly irritated his young wife. Lydia solved the problem by poisoning her husband with arsenic. But realizing that she couldn’t raise children alone, Lydia decided to get rid of them too.
She poisoned six-year-old Martha Ann, four-year-old Edward and baby William on the same day. Teenagers George and Ann Eliza were killed during illness - it was easier to cover their tracks. The eldest daughter died of natural causes shortly after these events. And Lydia got a job as a housekeeper for the wealthy farmer Dennis Hurlbort and soon became his wife.
Dennis soon died, leaving his widow a substantial fortune. It is not known why Lydia needed to get a job again, most likely for the sake of a new marriage. And so it happened: Lydia got a job as a nanny for Horace Sherman - he raised his daughter alone. The marriage as a whole was successful, if not for one thing: Horace loved to drink. This irritated Lydia so much that she decided to poison Sherman's daughter so that he would come to his senses. But instead, Horace started drinking even harder, and then Lydia poisoned him too.
Soon Lydia was arrested and sentenced to death, then commuted to life imprisonment. She ended her days in prison.
