The scary world of spiders: sexual violence, cannibalism, war on rodents

Is a spider an insect or not?

Many people wonder whether a spider actually is an insect or an animal. Most will immediately answer that it is an insect, but this is not the case. Even if in appearance this organism looks like crawling small inhabitants, it is in no way related to them and has distinctive features.

They are animals; among the inhabitants of the fauna they are classified as invertebrates. These are arthropods that have jointed limbs, a hard chitinous cover, which is a hard exoskeleton.

Therefore, the question arises why spiders are not insects and animals. And also interested in what exactly connects mammals, what common features they have with insects and differences from them. This is worth considering carefully.

General signs

The family of spiders and insects share some common characteristics. This is due to the fact that arachnids belong to the class of arthropods.

There is certainly some spider at a distance of a meter from us

This myth originated with archaeologist Norman Platnick, who in a 1995 article stated that “anywhere a person is within a few meters of him there is likely to be some kind of spider.” While it's hard to imagine exactly how many spiders there are in the world, it's absurd to think that you can't lie down or walk a few steps without being in their company. People took this statement as a fact, and now they are speculating on it. And “several meters” was changed to “meter”, and the word was probably discarded altogether. In 2001, this statement was already cited in books as a fact.

Interesting facts about spiders

Unusual facts about spiders will amaze many who do not yet know about these creatures. But they conceal many mysteries, secrets, and have unique features that other organisms living on the globe do not have.

Let's look at 15 interesting facts about spiders:

1. The web is not only a trap for insects, it is capable of deflecting several millimeters in order to grab and stick an insect to itself. This phenomenon is carried out due to a static charge, which appears during the flight of the insect.
2. The bite of the Brazilian wandering spider is not always fatal, but it often causes impotence in men.
3. With the help of its limbs, the spider can determine what has reached it in the web. But edible or inedible helps him establish the olfactory organs, which are located on his legs.
4. The animal has a durable shell. Its strength can withstand a nuclear explosion.
5. The web is very light. If you take a spider thread the length of the earth's equator, then its weight will be only 340 grams.
6. Spider web is considered a powerful and durable material. If its thickness is increased to the thickness of a pencil, then such a web could stop a Boeing. In New Guinea, fishermen use this material to catch fish, and in South America there are spider web bridges that support monkeys.
7. The lifespan of arthropods is 30 years. But they rarely die of old age.
8. At one time, the female can lay up to 20 thousand eggs, from which spiders hatch.
9. In nature, there are varieties of spiders that, after being born, eat their mother.
10. There are varieties of arachnids in which the brain occupies the largest part of the body, so other organs are forced to be located on the legs. The smaller the spider, the larger its brain.
11. In the Netherlands there are more spiders than people. For 15 million human population there are 5 thousand billion arthropods.
12. In Cambodia, people enjoy eating tarantula spiders. They are also brought up at home, they learn to dance, and play willingly. And if necessary, they can protect the owner.
13. There are types of spiders that do not weave webs - the jumping spider, the lynx spider. They do not catch prey with webs, but hunt it.
14. Tarantulas can live without food for about two years.
15. The gladiator got its name due to the fact that it weaves a web in a square. He does not leave her until the prey falls into her; he himself abruptly throws the net on her, thereby leaving no chance to escape.

Tarantulas can shoot poisonous needles

Tarantulas are large spiders covered in hairs, which make them even more repulsive to humans. There are many legends about deadly tarantula bites, but they are not true: tarantulas are not very aggressive creatures and will not bite unless they are attacked, and their bite, although painful, is no more unpleasant or dangerous than a wasp sting . But tarantulas have another, much more terrible weapon. If you show aggression towards it, it turns its belly towards the source of danger and shoots a bunch of poisonous hairs in its direction - thin as threads and sharp as needles. Digging into the victim's skin, these hairs cause severe irritation. The only way to quickly get rid of them is to use duct tape as an emergency hair removal strip.

Interesting Facts

Spiders inspire fear in people, but at the same time they inspire interest. Therefore, they are studied and even raised at home as pets.

Flying spiders There is evidence that some species of spiders can fly. And this is not to instill fear in the impressionable. This method is a protection and a method of movement.

Spiders with a tail There were individuals that had a tail. Unusual tailed spiders and their descendants.

Spider web Spider web is a durable and stable material; it can stretch many times and return to its original position.

Range, habitats

These animals live everywhere, with the exception of Antarctica and other regions covered with ice all year round. They are also absent on some remote islands, where they simply could not reach. Most species inhabit equatorial regions and the tropics, in particular tropical rainforests.

They settle in burrows underground, in cracks on tree trunks, in the thick of branches and foliage. They can live in any cracks and crevices, often settling under stones. Many of the species of spiders have chosen people's homes as their habitat, where they feel quite comfortable.

Among the predominant number of terrestrial species, only the silver spider and some spiders that hunt on the surface of the water chose the water element as their habitat.

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Man and Spider

Spiders play a fairly significant role in people's lives:

• arthropods destroy many harmful insects, helping to preserve the yield of agricultural plants;
• in some countries, well-cooked spiders of some species are considered a delicacy;
• scientists are actively studying the properties of spider venom and exploring the possibilities of using it in medicine to treat various diseases, for example, Alzheimer's disease or erectile dysfunction;
• some species are very popular as exotic pets;
• physicists are studying the unique properties of the web and its role in the life of spiders and are trying to create a similar material.

In addition, the unusual appearance and abilities of arthropods have become the reason that spiders often become characters in works of art: comics, books, films.

But the danger of spiders to humans is greatly exaggerated. Indeed, the bite of some poisonous individuals can cause health problems, but very often the person himself provokes an attack. It is extremely rare for spiders to attack people for no reason.

Arachnophobia

Arachnophobia, or fear of spiders, is one of the most common and difficult to treat phobias in the world. People with this disease experience attacks of fear and sometimes panic at the sight of even the smallest and most harmless spider.

Moreover, not only a living person, but also his image can cause negative emotions. Attacks are often accompanied by weakness, dizziness, nausea and increased sweating. Particularly sensitive people faint.

Fun fact: Most patients have never experienced an arachnid attack, so their fears are unfounded.

People

Even people sometimes consider them as delicious food. In Skune, Cambodia, fried tarantulas are widely sold. Moreover, they are sold there like regular food. Live insects are also drowned in rice wine to create a natural medicinal drink. Spiders are regularly purchased by tourists who visit Scone or pass through it to other regions.

Spiders are one of the oldest creatures on our planet. These arthropods arose during the Paleozoic era, more than 300 million years ago. Maybe that's why they make so many people tremble with fear. Most of us not only cannot imagine how to eat them, but we are also often afraid to look at them. But other living beings perceive their meat as a delicacy.

Features of reproduction

During the process of active growth, spiders from time to time shed their tight shell, which consists of a chitinous structure. They gradually acquire a new, stronger one.

Over the entire period of their life, they can molt up to 10 times . Spiders are heterosexual individuals, with the female being much larger than the male.

The mating period lasts quite a long time, its season begins in mid-autumn and lasts until early spring. At this time, the male fills the bulbs, which are located at the ends of the pedipalps, with sperm, then he goes in search of the female.

After performing the “mating dance” and fertilization, the male leaves and dies in the subsequent period.

As soon as 2.5 months have passed, the female lays eggs. After 35 days, spiderlings hatch from them and live in the web until the first molt. Sexual maturity in females occurs at the age of 3-5 years.

Natural enemies

In nature, spiders have many enemies who are not averse to biting them. These include birds, as well as other vertebrates: amphibians and reptiles (for example, salamanders, geckos, iguanas), as well as mammals (for example, hedgehogs or bats). Some species of spiders, such as mimetids, feed exclusively on spiders of other species. Tropical insects and ants also do not miss the opportunity to prey on them.

Adults of some species of wasps do not eat spiders themselves, but instead turn them into a kind of food warehouse for their offspring.

They paralyze their victims and carry them to their nest, where they lay eggs inside their bodies. The hatched larvae lead a parasitic lifestyle, literally eating the spider from the inside.

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Insects and spiders

These two types of arthropods are often confused. But they have much more differences than they have in common. Among insects, there are those that eat meat and those that are vegetarians. Spiders are mostly predators.

Spiders are definitely not insects! More differences in the structure and behavior of insects and spiders in the article at the link.

Spider Anatomy

Spider eyes The number of eyes is not an indicator of good vision. And spiders are a prime example of this.

Spider legsThe limbs perform not only a walking role. They help in hunting.

Spider reproductionThe method of reproduction of spiders is determined by their lifestyle and structural features.

Birds

A large number of insectivorous birds feed on spiders, including blackbirds, tits, sparrows, crows, etc. For example, tits bring large quantities of these insects to their chicks before they are ready to leave the nest. According to scientists, this bird chooses them among all existing insects due to the fact that they contain large amounts of taurine. Taurine is an amino acid that affects the development of the entire body, leading to increased intelligence, decreased anxiety and improved vision. By feeding its chicks with these insects, the tit provides them with the necessary element that will allow the offspring to grow into brave and intelligent adults.

Is a spider an insect or not? Why is a spider not an insect?

Spiders, especially small ones, are similar in appearance to insects, but are not insects. But why is a spider not an insect?

Insects and arachnids are divided into two different classes, which belong to the same phylum of animals - arthropods. They have some similarities in structure, but there are many more differences. Family connections are revealed by the chitinous cover and some details of the body structure: the chest and abdomen are connected by a thin stalk, legs are located in pairs on the sides of the chest. Only an insect has six legs, and a spider has eight. In addition, the spider has chelicerae - small limbs with poisonous claws located next to the mouthparts.

The front part of the body is also different: in insects the movable head is separated from the chest; in arachnids there is not even any semblance of a “neck”; the head is combined with the chest into one part of the body, which is called the cephalothorax.

Black widow (Latrodectus mactans)

Insects have two eyes with a complex structure, spiders have much more primitive eyes, but there are eight of them. There are spiders with six eyes and rarely with two.

Insects are carnivores and vegetarians. The former eat their food with powerful jaws and literally chew their food; the latter mainly feed on nectar using “proboscis”. The feeding of spiders is radically different - they inject gastric juice into their prey, wait until the soft tissues soften and then suck up the nutritious “soup” through a narrow mouth slit, devoid of teeth, lips and, in general, any signs of the oral apparatus familiar to us. Almost all spiders are predators; only one species has been found that feeds on plants - Kipling's bagheera spider.

The head of all types of insects is decorated with a pair of antennae; spiders do not have these antennae.

Another striking difference is the web. Spiders have three pairs of arachnoid warts that release a thin stream of sticky liquid, which hardens after a few seconds without losing its stickiness. A spider's web is a trap for insects that do not know how to create such deadly laces.

By the way, the spider is much more closely related than insects to scorpions and mites, which also belong to the class of arachnids.

Arachnophobia is a special case of zoophobia, fear of arthropods (mainly arachnids), and is one of the most common phobias. Moreover, for some people, it is not even the spider itself that can cause much greater fear, but the image of the spider.

Diet in the natural environment

Spiders are classified as obligate predators, whose menu includes exclusively small vertebrates and insects

. Arachnologists mention the only exception - Bagheera kiplingi, living in Central America.

Upon closer examination, Kipling's Bagheera is not 100% vegetarian: during the dry season, this spider (for lack of Vachellia acacia foliage and nectar) devours its relatives. In general, the ratio of plant and animal food in the diet of Bagheera kiplingi looks like 90% to 10%.

Hunting methods

They depend on the lifestyle, sedentary or nomadic. A wandering spider usually lies in wait for its victim or carefully creeps up to it, overtaking it with one or two or three jumps. Nomadic spiders prefer to envelop prey with their threads.

Sedentary spiders do not run after the victim, but wait until it wanders into a skillfully woven net. These can be either simple signal threads or sophisticated (large in area) networks stretched to the observation post of their owner.

This is interesting!

Not all hunters entangle their victims with webs: some (for example,) simply wait for the insect’s body to soften to the desired condition. Sometimes the spider releases its prey. This happens in two cases: if it is too large or has a strong smell (bug).

The spider kills prey with a toxin concentrated in poisonous glands, which are located in the chelicerae or (as in Araneomorphae) in the cephalothorax cavity.

The spiral muscles surrounding the glands contract at the right moment, and the poison reaches its destination through a hole at the tip of the claw-like jaws. Small insects die almost immediately, while larger ones continue to convulse for some time.

Hunting objects

For the most part, these are insects of suitable size. Spiders that weave nets more often catch all flying creatures, especially dipterans.

The species “assortment” of living creatures is determined by habitat and season. Spiders that live in burrows and on the soil surface eat mainly beetles and orthoptera, not disdaining, however, snails and earthworms. Spiders from the family Mimetidae target spiders of other species and ants.

Argyroneta, a water spider, specializes in aquatic insect larvae, fish fry and crustaceans. Spiders from the genus Dolomedes, which inhabit wet meadows and swamps, eat approximately the same thing (small fish, larvae and tadpoles).

The most interesting “dishes” are included in the menu of tarantula spiders:

• small birds;
• small rodents;
• arachnids;
• insects;
• fish;
• amphibians.

Young snakes often appear on the table of the Brazilian tarantula Grammostola, which the spider devours in huge quantities.

Nutrition method

It has been proven that all arthropods demonstrate an arachnid (extraintestinal) type of nutrition. The spider has everything adapted for consuming liquid food, from the filtering device of the pre-oral cavity and pharynx, the narrowed esophagus and ending with a powerful sucking stomach.

Important!

Having killed the victim, the spider tears and crushes it with its jaws, releasing digestive juice inside, designed to dissolve the insides of the insect.

At the same time, the spider sucks up the protruding liquid, alternating between eating and injecting juice. The spider does not forget to turn the corpse over, processing it from all sides until it turns into a dried mummy.

Spiders that attack insects with hard cover (for example, beetles) pierce their articular membrane with chelicerae, usually between the chest and head. Digestive juice is injected into this wound, and the softened contents are sucked out from there.