Newly discovered spider builds spring loaded snare to catch ants
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Re: Newly discovered spider builds spring loaded snare to catch ants
#2I wonder why biological organisms are capable of such absurdly high accelerations. Article reminded me of cnidocytes which apparently produce anywhere between 40,000 and 5,410,000 g. Is it because of the small masses involved?
Re: Newly discovered spider builds spring loaded snare to catch ants
#3I wonder why biological organisms are capable of such absurdly high accelerations. Article reminded me of cnidocytes which apparently produce anywhere between 40,000 and 5,410,000 g. Is it because of the small masses involved?
Strength of fibers scales with crossection area, mass scales with volume.
Re: Newly discovered spider builds spring loaded snare to catch ants
#4It is truly fascinating, I wonder how it evolved like that.
Before becoming a spring as it is today how was it hunting in the past? What constraints made it need such a mechanism instead of a typical web?
Re: Newly discovered spider builds spring loaded snare to catch ants
#5link to the paper here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48635929
Re: Newly discovered spider builds spring loaded snare to catch ants
#6The videos are amazing. Sadly I think theses types of adaptations make it easier for the species to go extinct since its so highly specialized.
Re: Newly discovered spider builds spring loaded snare to catch ants
#7The videos are amazing. Sadly I think theses types of adaptations make it easier for the species to go extinct since its so highly specialized.
>theses types of adaptations make it easier for the species to go extinct since its so highly specialized.
super interesting. I'm guessing because being highly dependent on a single tactic can make it difficult to adapt or course change ?
Re: Newly discovered spider builds spring loaded snare to catch ants
#8It is the year 2038. A new brand of slingshot is almost immediately removed from store shelves after multiple children receive through-and-through wounds.
Re: Newly discovered spider builds spring loaded snare to catch ants
#9It is truly fascinating, I wonder how it evolved like that. Before becoming a spring as it is today how was it hunting in the past? What constraints made it need such a mechanism instead of a typical web?
Injured Himenoptera are known to send pheromones that trigger a vicious defensive response from other members of the colony. On a typical web the companion ants would do what the ants do. Go to war and flood the place surrounding the danger until eventually killing it. The spider does not have neither the stamina, nor the venom amount to deal with that. This web is designed to extract just one ant, while cutting the path that the ant rescuers could follow.
This is the first spider web known designed to catch only one species of prey. That alone would make the finding extraordinary. The trap can lure only green ants and serve the food exactly were the spider wants it; granting access to a common source of food that is everywhere, but also that is very dangerous to hunt (as much big as the spider, with powerful jaws, and much stronger).
The video shows one most interesting thing: Notice that the spider is carefully moving out of the way, just a second before the ant is launched. The spider knows in advance that its current location is about to be hit by a bungee jumping ant, and acts accordingly just in time to avoid the "bullet". We can easily imagine the spider thinking 5,4,3... This means that spider brains can predict the future outcome of a complex movement of objects in the physical system of its trap, and also calculate how much time the fibers will resist the jaw of the ant.
Re: Newly discovered spider builds spring loaded snare to catch ants
#10It is truly fascinating, I wonder how it evolved like that. Before becoming a spring as it is today how was it hunting in the past? What constraints made it need such a mechanism instead of a typical web?
Amazing specialization. I was wondering the same thing. Cave glow worms cast a "fishing line," and this is similar-ish. I wonder if N million years ago, a couple of fishing-line-like spiders started anchoring their lines, and the ones with a more conic shape anchor may led to more success over time. And the anchor may have only worked on territorial prey. Fun stuff to imagine.