The closest relative of Kangaroo Island’s trapdoor spider lives in South Africa - and the arachnid could have arrived in Australia by oceanic migration.
Spider silk is strong stuff and could be used to manufacture ultra tough ropes and cables, and better sutures in medicine. If only we could find a way to make the stuff.
Australia’s snakes, spiders and other venomous critters tend to strike fear in many people. But is Australia’s reputation as a nation of deadly creatures deserved?
Biologists, along with most of the internet, have been puzzled as to why peacock spiders have such flamboyant courtship displays. So we decided to find out.
Scientists in Japan have discovered a new species of wasp that induces a zombie-like state in spiders in order to manipulate them into protecting the wasp’s own offspring.
All spiders are predators, but most of them are small and have rudimentary defences against larger animals that in turn prey on them. Spiders have thus evolved a range of predatory behaviours that, at…