spider
edyong | April 28, 2009The courtship rituals of the spider Harpactea sadistica start innocently enough, with a dance and a hug. The male spider taps the female gently with his front legs and embraces her. But from that point onwards, things for the female go rapidly downhill. The male bites her and she becomes passive, allowing him to manoeuvre her into position. Like all spiders, his genitals are found next to his head, on a pair of appendages called the pedipalps. But unusually, his penis ends in a needle-sharp tip called an embolus.
The embolus sits at the end of a loop called the conductor. The male hooks one…
bleimanb | April 28, 2009So you start out with a simple experiment, so simple in fact, that it sounds like Andrew and I came up with it when we were seven: How long do different species of spider survive underwater? You take 120 wolf spiders of three different species that live in marsh lands, and you submerge them underwater until they drown. Simple enough. Some live 24 hours, some 28 hours, and some 36. Ok, that's a long time, but it makes sense as these creatures live in marshes so they must have adapted to survive submerged for extended periods of time. It is then, however, that things take a turn for the…
edyong | February 16, 2009The wiping of unwanted memories is a common staple of science-fiction and if you believe this weekend's headlines, you might think that the prospect has just become a reality. The Press Association said that a "drug helps erase fearful memories", while the ever-hyperbolic Daily Mail talked about a "pill to erase bad memories". The comparisons to The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind were inevitable, but the actual study, while fascinating and important, isn't quite the mind-wiper these headlines might have you believe.
The drug in question is propranolol, commonly used to treat high…
zooillogix | November 30, 2008Two weeks ago the University of Colorado College of Engineering sent two orb weaving spiders up in the space shuttle. The spiders' web building behavior was observed and streamed back to earth, serving as a classroom tool for teaching fifth though ninth graders about the effects of zero gravity. Great idea. Except when scientists opened up the second spider's box, they found it had escaped. Thus began the plot to a perfect B- Sci-Fi/Horror flick. Unfortunately for all of us safely earthbound observers, the other spider turned up in its buddy's box shortly thereafter, having succeeded only in…
sporte | November 21, 2008A loose spider on a space station.
Technorati Tags: humor, 'snakes, on, a, plane', spider, spiders, 'space, station'
Apparently the missing orb-weaver spider is gone from it's cage and can't be found anywhere.
And for the record, I don't know what kind of spider is in my photograph. It's a spider that lives in Fairbanks, AK.
From the Telegraph:
It was hoped the missing spider might have sought refuge in its neighbour's tank, but the remaining spider has spun a web so thick, to cope with the zero-gravity conditions, that is is impossible to check.
The runaway spider, which was meant to be the…
grrlscientist | October 26, 2008tags: spider eats bird, golden orb spider, chestnut-breasted Mannikin, birds, avian, WTF, wow
Golden Orb Spider eats a chestnut-breasted Mannikin in Australian garden.
Image and story: Daily Mail.
This picture and story is so creepy that it makes my skin crawl to see this at the top of my blog. But it's also very strange -- the stuff of nightmares!! -- so I had to share it with you. If you are an arachnophobe, as I am, this will defintely give you nightmares. But if you are insatiably curious about the natural world, as I am, follow the link for the story and for more gruesome images --…
zooillogix | October 1, 2008Built by the French performing arts group "La Machine" for Liverpool's European Capital of Culture program a few weeks back, the giant arachnid reaches 15 meters tall and weighs 37 tons.
Built from both steel and wood, it utlizes a hydraulic system to move all spider-like and is operated by 12 people all sitting atop or strapped below the cephalothorax. If even one of those 12 drivers so much as yawns, the giant metal spider will grab the nearest human victim with its powerful jaws and suck out all of their internal juices.
We're trying to track down schematics so you can build your own at…
grrlscientist | March 25, 2008tags: spider, web building, mind-altering drugs, streaming video
This streaming video documents that spiders web-building abilities are affected by exposure to mind-altering drugs, like weed, as demonstrated by in 1960 Dr. Peter Witt. [1:49].
zooillogix | October 31, 2007Using a technique called very high-resolution x-ray computed tomography, researchers at the University of Manchester dissected a 50 million year old spider encased in amber. As reported in Zootaxa, leveraging the same technology used in CAT scans, it can make out features the width of a human hair. In this case, the technique enabled the researchers to identify the critter of Halloween past as a new species.
zooillogix | October 4, 2007Famed artist, Louise Bourgeois, clearly had an interesting relationship with her mother. Her new installation at the Tate Modern, Maman (1999) is a giant 30ft sculpture made of bronze, steel and marble and was intended as an "ode to my mother" according to Bourgeois. Inside of the spider's immense cage-like body, lies a clutch of eggs. While the Tate describes it is a strong and warm representation of motherhood, "A female spider, this spectacular arachnid alludes to the strength of the mother with metaphors of spinning, weaving, nuture and protection", the Guggenheim Bilbao, where the piece…
grrlscientist | August 31, 2007tags: spider, giant spider web,arachnid, social behavior
Lake Tawokoni State Park rangers (l-r) Mike McCord and Freddie Gowin continue to monitor a giant communal spider web at the park Tuesday, August 29, 2007. Officials at Lake Tawokoni State Park have been watching the growth of a giant communal spider web that has formed in the park over the past several weeks. The giant spider webs are rare for Texas.
Image: Tom Pennington. [Scary wallpaper size]
Have you heard about the spiders that spun a web that is the size of Texas? Well, actually, the web is only the size of two football…
pharyngula | August 30, 2007Admit it: if you were walking along and saw this on the trail, you'd stop and turn back, wondering if Shelob was sneaking up behind you.
Bug girl has the explanation.
zooillogix | August 3, 2007Jumping spiders have exceptional vision and therefore, their courtship displays have a highly visual component. This nifty video shows a male jumping spider doing its equivalent of the Booty Drop. Make sure to have your volume on.
For more MTV Grind worthy jumping spider action, check out the Tree of Life Web Project.
zooillogix | June 19, 2007Tougher than steel and Kevlar, the silk of the black widow spider has long been coveted by manufacturing companies, defense contractors and comic-book reading nerds as a possible material of the future.
Scientists have spent years decoding pieces of the spiders' silk making genes, but now Nadia Ayoub and a group of researchers at the University of California-Riverside can create the full proteins and probably spider silk as well.
You want to manufacture my what!?
The silk making genes turn out to be quite long (over 10,000 base-pairs), but with very few introns or "junk DNA" sections that…
zooillogix | April 11, 2007A Chinese born, Paris-based artist hailed for his groundbreaking work that helped pave the way for a new generation of young artists in China is on the defensive after his most recent installation at the Vancouver Art Gallery. His work "Theatre of the World" features snakes, lizards, scorpions and a variety of dangerous insects trapped together inside a cage shaped like a turtle shell. The artist calls it a mirror of society's conflicts. Sadistic eight year olds call it a a rip-off of a favorite Saturday afternoon pastime. Regardless, it may be short lived as the SPCA has determined that the…
zooillogix | March 16, 2007In honor of St. Paddy's Day, a tribute to being green.
Northland Green Gecko, naultinus grayii
Green Lynx Spider, peucetia viridansGreen Hermit Hummingbird, phaethornis guy (we think)
Green Grasshopper, campylacantha olivacea