If the thought of spiders makes your skin crawl, you might find it reassuring that the chances of being bitten by a spider are smaller than you imagine, recent research shows.

Most so-called "spider bites" are not actually spider bites, according to researchers and several recent studies. Instead, "spider bites" are more likely to be bites or stings from other arthropods such as fleas, skin reactions to chemicals or infections, said Chris Buddle, an arachnologist at McGill University in Montreal.

"I've been handling spiders for almost 20 years, and I've never been bitten," Buddle told LiveScience. "You really have to work to get bitten by a spider, because they don't want to bite you."

For one thing, spiders tend to avoid people, and have no reason to bite humans because they aren't bloodsuckers and don't feed on humans, Buddle said. "They are far more afraid of us than we are of them," he said. "They're not offensive."

Not very scary

When spider bites do happen, they tend to occur because the eight-legged beasts are surprised — for example when a person reaches into a glove, shoe or nook that they are occupying at the moment, Buddle said.

Even then, however, the majority of spiders are not toxic to humans. Spiders prey on small invertebrates such as insects, so their venom is not geared toward large animals such as humans.

Many spiders aren't even capable of piercing human flesh. Buddle said he has observed spiders "moving their fangs back and forth against his skin," all to no avail. [Creepy, Crawly & Incredible: Photos of Spiders]

Only about a dozen of the approximately 40,000 spider species worldwide can cause serious harm to the average healthy adult human. In North America, there are only two groups of spiders that are medically important: the widow group (which includes black widows) and the recluse group (brown recluses). These spiders do bite people, and if they live in your area, you should know what they look like, Buddle said. But still, records show bites from these spiders are very infrequent.

The bite of widow spiders like the black widow is one of the only well-recognized spider bites in North America, with obvious, unmistakable symptoms, said Rick Vetter, a retired arachnologist at the University of California at Riverside. Signs can include intense pain and muscle contractions, which occur because the bite interferes with nerves in muscles.

Nowadays, deaths from the bite are rare thanks to widow spider antivenom. Before this was developed, however, treatments for black widow bites included whiskey, cocaine and nitroglycerine, according to a review Vetter published this month in the journal Critical Care Nursing Clinics of North America.

Misidentified 'bites'

Often, black widow and brown recluse spiders are misidentified, and reported in regions where they are extremely unlikely to actually live, Vetter said. For example, In South Carolina, 940 physicians responding to a survey reported a total of 478 brown recluse spider bites in the state — but only one brown recluse bite has ever been definitively confirmed in the state. Recluses are mainly found in the central and southern United States, according to Vetter's study.

"I've had 100 recluse spiders running up my arm, and I've never been bitten by one," Vetter told LiveScience.

The vast majority of "spider bites" are caused by something else, research shows. One study Vetter cited found that of 182 Southern California patients seeking treatment for spider bites, only 3.8 percent had actual spider bites, while 85.7 percent had infections.

And a national study found that nearly 30 percent of people with skin lesions who said they had a spider bite actually had methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections. Other things that can cause symptoms that mimic spider bites include biting fleas or bedbugs, allergies, poison oak and poison ivy, besides various viral and bacterial infections, Vetter said.

In recent years, doctors have become better at identifying true spider bites, Vetter writes.

But spiders are still widely regarded as dangerous to humans, which is generally not the case, Buddle said.

Spiders are good at killing "nuisance insects," which may be more likely to bite humans than spiders, Buddle added. "In the vast majority of cases, spiders are our friends."

Email Douglas Main or follow him on Twitter or Google+. Follow us @livescience, Facebook or Google+. Article originally on LiveScience.com.

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Jumping spiders are unique in the spider world as they don’t build webs – they’re active visual predators who rarely use silk.

In fact, the main use we thought jumping spiders had for silk was a safety line for when they miss their mark.

But a study published today in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface by Chinese researchers shows a previously unknown feature of draglines of silk — they’re used to stabilize jumping spiders (in particular, Hasarius adansoni) while mid-air to ensure a safe and nimble landing, as shown in the video below:

Remove the draglines of silk and spiders land clumsily, lose their footing and nearly tumble abdomen-over-head; hardly the efficient hunters made out to be.

The flair these little gymnasts demonstrate is due to their control with their dragline, rather than their eight legs. This highlights the importance of these findings as previously we only appreciated the wings of birds and tails of lizards to have these stabilizing properties.

So maybe Stan Lee should consider these new findings in any future Spider-Man films, as Peter Parker wouldn’t have such deft in-air agility without his trusty safety-line.

Michael Kasumovic receives funding from the Australian Research Council for his evolutionary research on crickets and spiders.

This article was originally published at The Conversation. Read the original article.

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This image of a spider eating a frog was caught during a survey of the South American Rainforest called the Rapid Assessment Program, led by Conservation International.

The image shows a Wolf spider  — a large spider with excellent eyesight — devouring a poison dart frog. They capture prey by popping out of their underground burrows and grabbing it as it walk by. The spider injects the frog with venom that liquefies its internal organs, which the frog then sucks out. 

They found about 60 new species and saw tons of other species they had seen before, but were able to photograph. See the amazing images they took >

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The ground-dwelling jumping spider is a fearsome beast. It can scale vertical surfaces with ease and spring 25 times its body length to nab prey.

Its legs are the eight crucial tools responsible for the pounce, but until recently, the evolutionary origin of some of their structures was misunderstood.

By comparing the legs of 330 species, German biologists determined that the sticky feather-like hairs at the end of the leg, called setae, evolved from hairy pads that originally helped the spiders wrangle food. Now, the hairs provide 32,000 contact points per leg, enabling the arachnids to walk up walls.

Other appendages also help with the hunt: two claws for grasping and bristles that detect air currents, tastes, and smells. To jump, the spider directs its hemolymph to the legs. The sudden rush causes them to extend all at once, and the spider goes flying.This article originally appeared in the October 2013 issue of Popular Science.

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Scientists have finally found the culprit behind the strange web towers in the image to the right, first discovered last year in the Amazon.

Images of these towers went viral back in August of 2013, and many suspected it was made by a spider — since it was spun out of silk — but no one knew which spider, or what the weird webs were for.

Phil Torres from the Tambopata Research Center, Lary Reeves and Geena Hill from the University of Florida, and wildlife photographer Jeff Cremer from Perunature.com trekked deep into the Peruvian Amazon to study the structures and attempt to identify what was creating them.

They were accompanied by science journalist Nadia Drake, who documented their trek on the Wired Science blog.

The team located about 45 of the web towers and observed and dissected some of them, but their results were inconclusive. The scientists began to think the structures might be just a tower of sperm designed to entice and fertilize female spiders.

On the last day of the trip, though, one of the strange structures hatched, and a baby spider emerged. You can see what the teeny tiny baby mystery spider below:

The scientists saw several adult spiders around, but never witnessed them constructing the towers, so they still don't know how the structures are made. They did observe lots of mites around the sticky web fences and towers like the one below.

At first the scientists had entertained the idea that the silk-producing mites might be responsible for the structures, but once the baby spiders hatched the scientists knew that couldn't be right.

Instead, the scientists believe that the sticky fence surrounding the web towers might be a way to ensnare mites as food for the newly hatched spiders or a defense mechanism to protect the spider egg from ants or other tiny predators.

You can see how the thin strands of web create a perimeter around the center tower containing the egg in the image below.

This is potentially the first documented case of a structure that hatches a single spider egg: usually spiders lay multiple eggs that hatch in groups. The team of scientists are still trying to identify the spider.

See more from Drake about solving the mystery web-tower riddle >

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A new video has captured the remarkable tactic a tiny spider uses to catch insects: It uses its web as a slingshot to fling itself and the web at unsuspecting prey.

The video of the bizarre Amazonian spider was posted to YouTube on Jan. 8 and has garnered more than 250,000 views so far.

Georgia Institute of Technology graduate student Troy Alexander first noticed the unusual spider acrobatics at the Tambopata Research Center, an Amazon jungle lodge in Peru.

The tiny spider, which measures no more than 0.1 inch (3 millimeters) across, belongs to the family Theridiosomatidae, commonly known as Ray spiders. [In Photos: Spiders Hatched from Web Towers]

Though the spider family was identified about 80 years ago, very little is known about these tiny critters. The team thinks the particular spider may be the species Naatlo splendida but needs to collect specimens to be sure, Phil Torres, a Rice University ecology graduate student who has documented the spider's behavior, wrote in an email.

Spider acrobat

The minuscule spider builds a fairly ordinary web, about the size of the palm of a human hand. But in the middle, it creates a silk drawstring that it affixes to a nearby solid surface, but bunches up in the terminal hooks on its legs to pull the web off-center into a cone shape. The tiny hunter waits until it somehow senses the approaching bugs, and then releases the drawstring.

"The web goes flying, and so does Mr. Spider," said Jeff Cremer, the photographer who captured the spider's daredevil move. The flying web makes it much more likely that the hapless bug will become entangled in the silky lure.

The surprise attack works because the tension developed in the web is enough to launch the whole ensemble with high acceleration. (The hardy spiders aren't fazed by the speed.)

Other weird webs

The tactic may ensure that the webs can entangle even slow-flying insects such as mosquitoes, one of the spiders' preferred prey. Most spiders rely on the stickiness of their webs to trap flying insects, but at low speeds, the force of impact may not be enough to entrap the bugs.

"This method of flinging the web appears to make it much more likely that the prey will get tangled, as they seem to be getting slammed into its sticky web regardless of the prey's original flight speed," Torres said.

The spider isn't looking at the prey when it releases its lure, so the researchers think the spider is waiting to sense the vibrations of the bug's wing beats, Cremer told LiveScience.

This isn't the only unusual method spiders use to attract prey. Some spiders create charged webs that suck prey in using electrostatic attraction. Others weave elaborate ladderlike webs.

Follow Tia Ghose on Twitter and Google+.FollowLiveScience @livescience, Facebook& Google+. Original article on LiveScience.

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Miley Cyrus may have made "twerking" a household word, but male black widow spiders are the real masters of the rump-jiggling dance move. These arachnids twerk their abdomens to avoid getting eaten by potential mates.

The vibrations caused by the male spider's twerking travel along the females' webs, alerting the females to the presence of a potential mate, a new study finds. The vibrations are very different from the staccato, sporadic movements caused by ensnared prey.

"They take a few steps and then they stop and vibrate their abdomen, and then they take a few steps and vibrate again," study researcher Samantha Vibert, a doctoral candidate at Simon Fraser University in Canada, said of the males.

Vibert and her colleagues reported their findings today (Jan. 16) in the journal Frontiers in Zoology. [See Video of the Twerking Spiders]

Twerking males

Spiders use their webs as extensions of their own bodies, able to sense vibrations on the threads that trigger their response to prey. But when an arachnid gentleman caller comes along, he runs the risk of being mistaken for a delicious moth and attacked.

Vibert knew from observing hobo spiders (Tegenaria agrestisi) that mating spiders perform elaborate dances. She wanted to know what was behind these complex displays.

To find out, she and her colleagues investigated two web-dwelling spiders, the western black widow (Latrodectus Hesperus) and the hobo spider. Hobo spiders produce sheet webs, whose familiar, organized patterns usually come to mind when people think of spiderwebs. Black widows produce tangle webs, which look like cobwebs.

First, the researchers recorded vibrations of male spiders venturing onto females' webs as well as the vibrations made when a house fly or house cricket got trapped by the sticky silk. The researchers then compared the vibrations' duration, frequency and amplitude.

They found that prey and potential mates make very different vibrations. The male spiders produced continuous, long-duration vibrations with low amplitudes, meaning that they were "quiet" compared to the sporadic, percussive vibrations made by trapped prey.

The differences were especially pronounced in black widow spiders, Vibert told LiveScience. Male black widows produced these good vibes by moving their abdomens in a rapid motion — reminiscent of twerking.

Good vibrations

Next, the researchers played recorded vibrations onto webs occupied by females. The scientists tested vibrations from both prey and male spiders, played on either high or low, and watched how the females responded.

"It didn't really matter what the vibration sounded like, but it had to be quiet," Vibert said. "If you play back a very quiet, whisperlike vibration, then the females did not respond aggressively."

Strong vibrations sent the female spiders scurrying over in attack mode. But little whispers simply got their attention — some turned toward the source of the vibrations, and some even responded with abdominal twitches of their own, suggesting back-and-forth communication.

That wouldn't be the only amazing trick spiders can play with their webs. On Jan. 8, a YouTube video revealed the magic of the slingshot spider (probably a species called Naatlo splendida), which actually flings its entire web at potential prey.

Still, it's the communication aspect that amazes Vibert.

"I think what really blew my mind was just how complex their signaling system is," she said. Courting spiders often show off with graceful dances, bobbing, weaving and circling around their intended mate, Vibert said.

"Spiders can be really beautiful, and they're a lot more complex than most people give them credit for," Vibert said. "If you go past the spider fear, the phobia, there are really quite a lot of things that will make you smile."

Follow Stephanie Pappas on Twitter,Google+. Follow us @livescience, Facebook,Google+. Original article on LiveScience.

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Nothing strikes fear into the hearts of more people than spiders. The eight-legged beasts boast a menacing appearance, and some pack a deadly, poisonous bite.

Spiders form the largest part of the arachnid family, with about 40,000 different species of spiders crawling the planet. And about a dozen of these species are deadly enough to kill a human. We take you on a tour of three of the deadliest spiders in the world, which can lurk anywhere from a forest floor to your own backyard.

Brazilian wandering spider

The Brazilian wandering spider, or banana spider, has repeatedly ranked as the world's most venomous spider in "Guinness World Records." Fittingly, it belongs to the genus Phoneutria, which means "murderess" in Greek. [Creepy! Amazing Photos of Spiders]

The spider's bite is potent enough to kill a human within minutes if antidote isn't delivered. Even with antivenom, on rare occasions, the bite can still prove deadly. Just 6 micrograms of venom are enough to kill a 20-gram mouse, and the spider carries more than 10 times that amount of venom in reserve.

In addition, the spider's bite can cause a long, painful erection in men, scientists discovered in 2007. The venom boosts levels of nitric oxide, a chemical that increases blood flow, and some have considered using the venom in drugs for erectile dysfunction.

Found mostly in South America, the large brown spider, which sometimes sports a black spot on its belly, can reach up to 2 inches (5 centimeters) in body length, with a leg span of 5 to 6 inches (12 to 15 cm).

The spider has a trademark move, raising its two front legs in an intimidating pose when frightened. This pose reveals the arachnid's red-haired fangs. The "wandering" part of its name comes from the spider's hunting habits. Instead of using a web to catch prey, the Brazilian spider "wanders" around and hunts on the ground.

Black widow spider

The ominously named black widow is a shiny black spider, but the females have an even more ominous hourglass-shaped mark on their abdomens, as if to say "time is running out." They earned the name "widow" because the females of many species eat the males after mating. Several species of black widow spiders exist, residing in temperate areas around the world. They are the most venomous spiders in North America. Before the antivenom was discovered, about 5 percent of black widow bites proved fatal.

These spiders like to lurk in woodpiles, sheds, outdoor furniture and chain-link fences, but they have a special predilection for old-fashioned outhouses. (Perhaps that's where these lyrics from the Australian country song about the black widow's cousin the redback spider come from: "There was a redback on the toilet seat/When I was there last night. I didn't see him in the dark/But boy, I felt his bite!") Fortunately, modern home plumbing and heating make such outhouse encounters rare.

Funnel web spider

The deadly Australian funnel web spiders owe their name to the conical webs these creatures use as burrows or prey traps. In fact, there are three different families of funnel web spiders, only some of which are dangerous to humans. The Hexathelidae family — the dangerous variety — includes about 40 species in Australia, such as the notorious Sydney funnel spider and its tree-dwelling cousins.

These spiders are usually black or brown; sport a shiny, hard, slightly hairy covering called a carapace on the front of their bodies; and range between 0.4 and 2 inches (1 to 5 cm) in body length. Nocturnal creatures, they prefer humid climates. Most live on the ground, but some dwell in trees. The bite can be life-threatening, especially in children, but is usually nonfatal if antivenom is administered.

So be careful of these little, leggy beasts. But if all these eight-legged horrors scare you, keep in mind that most deadly spiders are shy and attack only when threatened.

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I have personal interest in arachnophobia — the fear of spiders — because I am a spider expert, but also because my daughter has it. She is not alone. According to the American Psychiatric Association, phobias affect more than one in ten people in the US, and of those individuals, up to 40% of phobias are related to bugs (including spiders), mice, snake and bats.

There are clearly a lot of arachnophobes. But do they know why they fear spiders? Can they do something to control those fears?

Once bitten twice shy?

Psychologists believe that one reason why people fear spiders is because of some direct experience with the arachnids instilled that fear in them. This is known as the "conditioning" view of arachnophobia.

In 1991, Graham Davey at City University London ran a study to understand more about this view. He interviewed 118 undergraduate students about their fears of spiders. About 75% of the people sampled were either mildly or severely afraid of spiders. Of those most were female. (This gender bias in arachnophobia has been supported subsequent research.)

There was also an effect from family. Those people fearful of spiders reported having a family member with similar fears, but the study was unable to separate genetic factors from environmental ones. What is surprising is that Davey found that archanophobia wasn't the result of specific "spider trauma", which means there was no support for the conditioning view.

So what makes spiders so terrifying? Surely it must be the threat of being bitten? Davey looked at that issue too. It turns out that it is not so much a fear of being bitten, but rather the seemingly erratic movements of spiders, and their "legginess". Davey said:

Animal fears may represent a functionally distinct set of adaptive responses which have been selected for during the evolutionary history of the human species.

A criticism of Davey's work is that perhaps "conditioning" cannot be so easily dismissed, because the spider-trauma event may have occurred during childhood, and a specific spider event may be buried deep within memories. In 1997, Peter Muris and his colleagues at the University of Maastricht tried to looked into this.

Not surprisingly, if you give kids a list of things that might be scary for them, the vast majority check off things like not breathing, getting hit by a car, bombs, fire or burglars as quite important. Interestingly, if you give them a free option to tell researchers what sorts of things they fear the most, both boys and girls report "spiders" as their top fear (the second fear is being kidnapped, third is predators and fourth is the dark).

This is surprising. Of all the things kids might report, they list spiders as the number one fear. So in contrast to Davey's work, Muris finds that the kids that were most fearful of spiders could relate that fear to specific events. Perhaps conditioning is the pathway to arachnophobia.

Genes or environment?

But before we can be sure that conditioning is the main reason, we need to ensure that genetic factors are not involved too. In 2003, John Hettema at the Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioural Genetics and his colleagues conducted twin studies to tease apart genetic factors.

Identical twins have identical DNA but tend to live in different environments in adult life, which allows researchers to find out how genes affect behaviour. When Hettema recorded the responses of twins to "fear-relevant" images (spiders, snakes) compared to "fear-irrelevant" images (circles, triangles). Statistical analysis of the results revealed that genetic influences were "substantial", which means that arachnophobia is inheritable. You need not necessarily experience spiders to be fearful of them.

Scare tactics

So, to my dissatisfaction, arachnophobia is here to stay. But there may be a simple technique to reduce the fear these bugs cause. In 2013, Paul Siegel at the State University of New York and his colleague published a study that helped volunteers lessen their arachnophobia.

They first split the volunteers into phobic and non-phobic groups, based on simple spider-fear tests. After a week of doing these tests, both the groups were then given exposed to images of flowers or spiders, but the exposure was for such a very short time.

The idea was that people can't recognise the images consciously, but it has an effect on their subconscious. When the spider-fear tests were carried out on both these groups again, those who feared spiders had become less afraid.

While other general conclusions are hard to draw from the literature on arachnophobia, arachnologists like me should rejoice at the results of Hettema's study. If nothing else, at least sharing images of spiders may help reduce arahnophobia.

Chris Buddle does not work for, consult to, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has no relevant affiliations.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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The orb-web spider Cyclosa ginnaga has a pretty genius way of camouflaging itself from predators.

Can you tell what the eight-legged creature is trying mimic in the picture below?

If you guessed bird poop, then you're right on the mark.

"The C. ginnaga spider has a silver body and creates a white disc on its web that functions to attract prey," the researchers wrote in a a press blurb."But these characteristics may also make them conspicuous to predatory wasps."

So why do they hang out in the middle of the white blotch on their webs? By making them look like a splat of bird poop, it seems to hide them in plain sight.

Scientists led by I-Min Tso of the National Chung-Hsin University in Taiwan tested this out and reported their findings on Thursday, May 29, in the journal Scientific Reports.

The scientists recreated how the spider's color and web ornament (the small white patch at the center of the web) would look if they were seen by a wasp, since the wasps don't see color differences as well as we do and are the spiders main predators. The differences between the spider/ornament and a bird poop were at levels indistinguishable in the wasps's eyes.

They also saw that when the spiders' web ornaments were blackened with carbon powder they suffered from way more wasp attacks.

The researchers note there are alternate theories out there as to why these spiders make these web ornaments and this theory still needs to be compared to others directly.

But you have to hand it to the spiders — they do look remarkably like something that would come out of a bird's butt. Can you tell which is bird poop and which are spiders in the images below?

That's almost as good as this amazing moth, which pretends to be a spider:

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A pesticide made from spider venom has been found to kill insects without harming honeybees.

Researchers at Newcastle University combined venom from the Australian funnel-web spider and lectin from snowdrops to create a “bio-pesticide.”

Common neonicotinoid pesticides used on crops in Britain are believed to be behind a catastrophic decline in honeybees in recent years.

Approximately 90 percent of the world’s plants rely on pollinating insects to survive, meaning that a decline in bees could have a devastating impact on food production.

The new pesticide — Hv1/GNA — will allow bees to forage and pollinate without harm, scientists at Newcastle University’s School of Biology believe.

It is thought that neonicotinoids harm honeybee populations by attacking their nerve system, which disrupts learning and memory so that they cannot locate pollen or find their way back to the hive. During the Newcastle study, bees were exposed to varying concentrations of the spider and snowdrop poison over seven days. Researchers found it did not affect the bees’ memory, even in high doses.

Dr Geraldine Wright, of the university’s Honeybee Lab said: “If we destroy the biodiversity of pollinators then it will be irrelevant how effective our pesticides are because we won’t have any crops to protect.

“There is now substantial evidence linking neonicotinoid pesticides to poor performance and survival in bees and what we need now is a clear directive from government to develop and introduce bee-safe alternatives.”

There is currently a two-year Europe-wide ban on neonicotinoid pesticides, which runs out in April.

Scientists remain divided. Previously, Prof Li Field, head of crop protection at Rothamsted Research, has said the EU ban may cause governments to overlook other factors contributing to the decline in bees, such as climate change or viruses.

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Perhaps even creepier than spiders are city spiders. New research has found the humped golden orb-weaving spider grows larger and produces more eight-legged babies in urban areas.

This spider (Nephila plumipes) is indigenous to the Australian countryside, but it's also commonly found in and around urban areas, like the city of Sydney, in southeast Australia. And despite the fact that it's not their native landscape, these city-dwelling spiders are thriving, according to the study by researchers at the University of Sydney.

In urban environments, orb-weaving spiders grow to be larger than their counterparts in the country, the study found. These city spiders also have an increased ability to reproduce, something the researchers determined by weighing the female arachnids' ovaries. [Gallery: See Photos of Spooky Spiders]

The heightened ability to adapt to urban environments has earned this spider a reputation as an "urban exploiter," said lead researcher Lizzy Lowe, a doctoral candidate at the university's School of Biological Sciences.

"The effects of urbanization on wildlife are very varied — some do well, others don't," Lowe told Live Science in an email. "Animals which benefit from urbanization are called urban exploiters, and these species (including the spiders from this study) do better in urban areas than their natural habitats."

For the study, Lowe and her colleagues collected over 200 orb-weaving spiders from urban, semi-urban and semi-rural sites in and around Sydney. The urban and semi-urban sites included parks and gardens, as well as patches of vegetation surrounded by houses and other buildings. The semi-rural sites were less developed, consisting mostly of native shrubs and other vegetation, with few buildings nearby.

The researchers found that spiders living in urbanized areas with low vegetation had longer tibias (a segment of the leg) than their counterparts in semi-rural areas with high vegetation. Tibia length is used to determine the size of a spider, because the creature's abdomen size fluctuates depending on how much it eats, according to the researchers.

The average tibia length for a spider living in the more rural areas was 0.37 inches (9.4 millimeters). However, city-dwelling spiders had larger tibias, measuring 0.48 inches (12.1 mm) on average. And some urban spiders grew even bigger, with the largest of those collected measuring 0.55 inches (14.03 mm).

These urban spiders were also found to have ovaries that weighed up to 39 percent of their total body weight, the largest ovary to body weight ratio observed for all the spiders collected. These larger ovaries indicate a higher reproductive capacity, the researchers said.

The findings suggest that despite being more developed, areas with lots of buildings and roads are great places for these spiders to live, the researchers noted. The explanation for the species' city-loving habits is straightforward, Lowe said: These spiders like the heat.

"Hard surfaces [like buildings, roads and concrete] retain heat, leading to the urban island-heat effect," Lowe said. "This increase in temperatures is likely what is leading to increased growth of the spiders."

The urban heat island effect describes built-up areas that are hotter than nearby rural areas. Temperatures tend to increase in areas where buildings, roads and other infrastructure, which retain heat well, have replaced open land and vegetation, which help cool down the air, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). In addition, all of the energy produced in cities creates more heat compared with rural areas.

Heat islands can be up to 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit (3 degrees Celsius) warmer than surrounding areas, according to the EPA, making them ideal homes for the heat-loving orb-weaving spider. The spider's affinity for urban areas also benefits humans who live in these cities, Lowe pointed out.

"It is definitely not a bad thing to have spiders in the city," said Lowe, who noted the orb-weaving spider's tendency to feed on mosquitos and other insects that pester urban residents.

While the spider bite of a humped golden orb-weaver can cause localized pain and numbness for humans, these spiders rarely bite people, according to Lowe. In fact, Nephila plumipes is more likely to hide from humans than to hurt them, she said.

The study was detailed online Aug. 20 in the journal PLOS ONE.

Follow Elizabeth Palermo @techEpalermo. Follow Live Science @livescience, Facebook& Google+. Original article on Live Science.

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When I go out at night into the rainforest to search for katydids I don't like to have any company.

Not that I am particularly antisocial, but tracking skittish and cryptic animals is an activity that's better done alone. I walk slowly, trying not to disturb anything and anybody, slowly scanning the vegetation and the forest floor in the light of my headlamp.

Every now and then I turn the light off to fully immerse myself in the ambient sounds of the forest, which often helps me pinpoint a faint trill made by a katydid's wings. A few years ago I was deep in the rainforest of Guyana doing just that — listening to the sounds of the night in a complete darkness — when I heard the rustle of an animal running.

I could clearly hear its hard feet hitting the ground and dry leaves crumbling under its weight. I pressed the switch and pointed the light at the source of the sound, expecting to see a small mammal, a possum, a rat maybe.

And at first this is what I thought I saw — a big, hairy animal, the size of a rodent.

But something wasn't right, and for a split second the atavistic part of my brain sent a ping of regret that I didn't bring any companion with me on this particular night walk. But before that second was over I was lunging at the animal, ecstatic about finally seeing one of these wonderful, almost mythical creatures in person.

The South American Goliath birdeater (Theraphosa blondi) is the largest spider in the world.

For all the arachnophobes out there this is probably a good excuse to pave over large swaths of the Amazonian rainforest, but for the rest of us this species is one of biodiversity's crown jewels. Although far from being the largest member of the subphylum Chelicerata — this honor belongs to horseshoe crabs— Goliath birdeaters are ridiculously huge for a land arthropod.

Their leg span approaches 30 cm (nearly a foot) and they weigh up to 170 g — about as much as a young puppy. They truly are Goliaths, but are they bird eaters? Alas, the truth is a bit less exciting. Although definitely capable of killing small birds, they rarely have a chance to do so while scouring the forest floor at night (however, there is some anecdotal evidence that they may feed on bird eggs if they run across a nest).

Rather, they seem to be feeding on what is available in this moist and warm habitat, and what is available is earthworms — lots of them.

But how do they get to be so big?

Apparently, according to one study (Makarieva et al., Proc. R. Soc. B [2005] 272), it has to do with their metabolic rate, which is lower than in the Goliath birdeater's relatives. This allows it to function with lower levels of oxygen reaching its tissues and organs than those required by smaller, more active spiders.

In other words, the bigger the body the more difficult it is to provide oxygen to all its parts if the metabolic rate is to remain constant.

Regardless of the reason, because of its gargantuan size, the Goliath birdeater is probably the only spider in the world that makes noise as it walks. Its feet have hardened tips and claws that produce a very distinct, clicking sound, not unlike that of a horse's hooves hitting the ground (albeit, admittedly, not as loud). But this is not the only sound this spider makes.

Every time I got too close to the birdeater indt would do three things. First, the spider would start rubbing its hind legs against the hairy abdomen.

"Oh, how cute!", I thought when I first saw this adorable behavior, until a cloud of urticating hair hit my eyeballs, and made me itch and cry for several days.

If that wasn't enough, the arachnid would rear its front legs and open its enormous fangs, capable of puncturing a mouse's skull, and tried to jab me with the pointy implements. The venom of a birdeater is not deadly to humans but, in combination with massive puncture wounds the fangs were capable of inflicting, it was definitely something to be avoided.

And then there was a loud hissing sound. For a long time the source of the sound was a mystery, but now we know that it is produced by "setal entanglement"— some of the hairs (setae) on the legs are covered with microscopic hooks that scrape against other, feather-like setae, producing the loud warning hiss.

A couple of years after my first encounter with Theraphosa blondi I was in South America again, walking alone at night in the rainforest of Suriname. Suddenly my foot brushed against something big and moving, and I nearly tripped.

I froze, expecting a snake. "Nah, it's just another Goliath birdeater. Aren't you a cutie pie?"

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It’s the perfect stereotype: an entomologist who can’t get enough of the Beatles. Although naming a beetle after said favorite band would have been the ideal scenario, discovering a new species is not exactly an everyday occurrence, so scientist Fernando Pérez-Miles decided not to miss out on a rare opportunity. He named a previously unknown tarantula after one of his idols- John Lennon.

"I have been waiting for a while to dedicate a species to Lennon because I am a fan of the Beatles, " Pérez-Miles told National Geographic. "I decided not to wait anymore."

The previously unknown tarantula, Bumba lennoni, was discovered in a national forest in Pará, Brazil. It’s a member of the Theraphosidae family which includes the largest spider species in the world: Theraphosa blondi, or the Goliath birdeater. But this species doesn’t quite measure up to its dinner-plate-sized relative with a body size of only 1.3 inches.

Specimens of this arachnid were actually captured back in 2005, but it was only recently that Pérez-Miles’ team examined them closely and realized that they indeed discovered a new species. They were caught at night time which could suggest that they are nocturnal. Like other tarantulas, they possess defensive hairs on the abdomen which irritate the skin upon contact. The researchers were able to distinguish them from close relatives because the males have a particularly small sexual organ. Another distinguishing feature is the large number of small nodules (cuspules) around the mouth which possibly help the animal crush prey.

The genus name, Bumba, was inspired by a popular Brazilian festival called Boi-bumbá (hit my bull) and replaces the previous name Maraca. According to the team, lennoni was chosen because John Lennon helped "to make this world a gentler place."

SEE ALSO: Researchers In The Rainforest Took This Fantastic Image Of A Spider Eating A Frog

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Spider silk may lose its claim as the strongest known natural material after researchers found that limpet teeth have more mettle.

Spider silk is hailed by scientists for its strength and structure, but researchers in Britain have discovered that limpets -- snail-like sea creatures with conical shells -- have teeth with structures so strong they could be copied and used in making cars, boats and planes.

"Until now we thought that spider silk was the strongest biological material because of its super-strength and potential applications in everything from bullet-proof vests to computer electronics," said Asa Barber, a professor at Portsmouth University's school of engineering, who led the study.

"But now we have discovered that limpet teeth exhibit a strength that is potentially higher."

Barber's team examined the detailed mechanical behaviour of teeth from limpets with atomic force microscopy, a method used to pull apart materials all the way down to the level of the atom. They found the teeth contain a hard mineral known as goethite, which forms in the limpet as it grows.

The research was published on Wednesday in the Royal Society's scientific journal, Interface.

"Limpets need high-strength teeth to rasp over rock surfaces and remove algae for feeding when the tide is in," Barber said. "We discovered that the fibres of goethite are just the right size to make up a resilient composite structure."

The fibrous structures found in limpet teeth could in future be copied by materials scientists and used in high-performance engineering applications such as Formula 1 racing cars, the hulls of boats and the bodies of aircraft, Barber said.

(Reporting by Kate Kelland; Editing by Susan Fenton)

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There’s not an arachnophobe on the planet who couldn’t warm to these little darlings.

They’re called peacock spiders, they jump and they’re endemic to Australia. But don’t worry too much about the jumping bit, because they’re harmless.

Of the genus Maratus, the incredibly colourful and active spiders were once thought to fly, although it had been reported back as early as the 1950s that one species was using its display to attract mates. It took until 2008 for Australian Jurgen Otto to capture that behaviour on film.

Otto posts regular updates about the spiders on his Facebook page, as well as some amazing videos of their rituals and habits on his YouTube channel Peacockspiderman. His most recent post was this beautiful collage at the top of the page, which went a bit viral this week.

But the close-ups are the best, seemingly giving the little creatures personalities of their own:

His passion started in 2005 when he “stumbled across Maratus volans” in Sydney. He’d heard it sported a pair of colourful flaps and after playing with it for a while, he got the male to flare up.

Otto’s first experience with a peacock spider was a path in Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park near Sydney in 2005.

“It literally hopped across my path and I nearly stepped on it. Its colouration and swift movements intrigued me and I went back to the same spot repeatedly every couple of weeks to see whether I could perhaps find another one.”

It took him three years. And when he did, he tested a theory that the “wings” on its back for which it was named (“volans”) were actually for mateship displays.

“I managed to track down the female, then still unknown to science, and I exposed a male to her. I was just blown away by the spectacle that followed.

“The flaps were extended, a pair of legs went up into the air and the spider kept moving from side to side.”

Otto published the pics on the web, became an overnight sensation and found a lifelong passion.

From there, his collection (and fans of the spider) has rapidly expanded and there’s now some 37 identified species of peacock spider on his books. He has pictures of another nine unnamed species and knows of another five he hasn’t yet photographed.

The most recent two additions were actually found in southeast Queensland by graduate student Madeline Girard from the University of California, Berkeley.

Otto told Live Science that Skeletorus looked “dramatically different [from] all other peacock spiders”, making him think the group is even more diverse than we had thought.

This is Sparklemuffin (Maratus jactatus) trying to get lucky:

And this is Skeletorus (Maratus sceletus), getting his spooky on:

Otto met Girard to see Skeletorus, but he couldn’t be enticed into displaying by the females Otto had with him. It took another year for Otto to find more individuals in the region, and when he did, he was “amazed” to see the male in action.

Otto says he uses a Canon 5D III and Mp-e65 macro lens combined with Mt-24EX macro flash for stills and a Canon C100 combined with 100mm macro lens for video. He’s based in St Ives but will happily hop across to WA in his holidays on word there’s a new peacock spider about.

“My entire spare time is now devoted to these spiders, be it photography, filming, editing, raising young, writing scientific papers, communicating on the internet etc., I certainly don’t find time watching TV.”

The spider season only lasts from about September to November. Otto says he gets many requests from people asking if there’s a particular method to finding the spiders.

“My answer is ‘No, there isn’t’. “You simply have to walk around and observe the ground wherever you are, it’s as simple as that,” he says.

“Pretty much every habitat in the southern half of Australia seems suitable for them – coastal sand dunes and heath, open woodlands, any type of shrubby country, even desert sand dunes are inhabited by these spiders. Strangely you may find a concentration of them in one spot and when you walk a few metres they disappear.”

“Spider searches can be both frustrating and exhilarating. You can end up searching for hours and hours and not find anything or you can stumble upon a species new to science as soon as you step out of the car.”

If you already think they’re just as cute as buttons, they’re also between 3-7mm long, which just make’s Otto’s work all the more marvelous:

Otto does have a favourite – Maratus volans:

“It was the one that first introduced me to this group and changed my life, it is also one of the largest and the most flamboyant.

“Maratus speciosus is one of my most popular ones – everybody loves ‘Peacock Spider 7′ and I have to say it is a spider I would not have imagined to exist even in my wildest dreams. That clown face is unbelievable.”

“Then there is Maratus robinsoni, an absolute tiny spider, under 3mm in length. It changes its colours every time it moves.

“I don’t know, it is so hard to decide, I just love them all.”

“I’m even very fond of Maratus vespertilio (Peacock Spider 3), a species that is quite drab and people don’t seem to get as excited about it.”

Six years later, Otto has uncovered 37 species, several still unnamed, and there’s “a few more” sitting on his hard drive waiting to be outed. “Blueface”, at the top of this page, is one such unnamed species, and also happens to be one Otto raised himself from an egg.

“Who knows how many more are out there?” he said. “I will keep looking, chipping away.”

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Though we can kill them with a newspaper whack, spiders, no matter their size, are horrifying.

What is it about these often small and delicate creatures that make us pause in fear?

Well, researchers from Bernard College believe arachnophobia, a fear of spiders, stems from humanity's early days in Africa when spiders were a constant threat to our survival.

The researchers, Joshua New and Tamsin German, recently published a paper detailing how early humans were forced to develop a keen awareness of deadly threats, like spiders, in their environment. According to Phys.Org:

The paper stated that the human visual system may retain ancestral mechanisms uniquely dedicated to the rapid detection of immediate and specific threats, such as spiders and snakes, which persistently recurred throughout evolutionary time. The authors concluded that "Spiders may be one of a very few evolutionarily-persistent threats that are inherently specified for visual detection and uniquely ‘prepared' to capture attention and awareness irrespective of any foreknowledge, personal importance, or task-relevance."

The team's conclusion stems from the results of a sight experiment that involved participants viewing abstract shapes on a computer screen. Hidden among the random shapes were fear inducing images such as spiders, needles and flies. The team found that people honed in on the random spider image over any other, which they believe proves that humans have an ingrained cognitive response to the critters.

So, even though spiders aren't likely to pose a daily threat to your survival anymore, you can thank your ancient ancestors for your arachnophobia.

(h/t Phys.Org)

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Nicola Pugno from the University of Trento wondered what would happen if his team combined one of nature's strongest materials—spider silk—and one of man's strongest creations—graphene. (Why wouldn't you want to make spiders even more formidable?)

The team set about testing this combination by spraying five spiders with a water-graphene particle mixture. They also sprayed ten more spiders with a water-carbon nanotube mixture.

Graphene is a carbon-based material that is 200 times stronger than steel and thinner than human hair. Carbon nanotubes are also extremely thin, strong and made of carbon: they resemble rolled-up chicken wire because of the way that carbon bonds with itself.

Somehow, the spiders managed to incorporate the carbon-based particles into their silk for making webs. Some of the spiders didn't achieve this as effectively and their webs suffered as a result. Four spiders perished quickly after being sprayed with the mixture.

However, incredibly, some spiders interwove these carbon gifts into their webs to create silk around 3.5 times as tough and strong as the unaltered silk of the giant riverine orb spider.

It is still unknown how the spiders integrated the carbon into their silk. At the moment, it is speculated that the spiders may weave the carbon fibers into their silk as they spin it out. Alternatively, the spiders may be absorbing the nanotubes and infusing it into the silk-making process.

The study, published as a pre-print edition here, summarized that the spiders sprayed with the carbon nanotube mixture produced the strongest webs.The strength is comparable to the strongest carbon fibers or the material that limpet's teeth are made from.

This study is exciting for the future of fiber-creation. The possibilities of infusing man-made materials into living things are opening up new possibilities for producing bionic materials. What else could a spider mop up and integrate into spider silk? "This concept could become a way to obtain materials with superior characteristics,"Pugno says on the subject of bionic materials.

[Via Arxiv, New Scientist]

UP NEXT: The first viable product made with 'wonder material' graphene is about to hit stores

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