Come into my parlor
and I will share some spider facts

• Spiders have been on the planet for around 350,00 years.
  
• There are at least 37,000 known species of spiders in the world and approximately 700 species live in Florida.
  
• Spiders are invertebrates, arthropods and ARACHNIDS.
  
• The name of the class, Arachnida, comes from a young Greek girl Arachne. Her spinning and weaving were so perfect that she angered the goddess Athena, who turned Arachne into a spider to weave through the rest of time. There are several versions in Greek Mythology.
  
• The English word spider comes from the German word meaning spinner.
  
• Spiders have 2 body parts, a cephalothorax and abdomen.
  
• Spiders have 8 legs attached to the cephalothorax.
  
• Most spiders have poor eyesight even with 8 eyes. Some spiders may only have 2,4, or 6 eyes.
  
• All spiders are predators.
  
• Spiders as a group eat more insects than birds.
  
• Most female spiders live a year or two, but female tarantulas may live for 25 years. Most male spiders live 4-5 months except the male tarantula. They may live for 4-10 years.
  
• Some native cultures eat tarantulas.
  
• All spiders make silk, but not all spiders make webs. Some silk is sticky, some is dry. Silk is made in the abdomen and squirted from the spinnerets. Spiders have six spinnerets. Some spiders can make seven different kinds of silk.
  
• Silk is liquid until it hits the air and then it hardens.
  
• Spider silk has been used by primitive people for fishing nets, lures, bags and headdresses. Spider silk has been used for cross hairs in telescopes, levels and surveying equipment.
  
• Most all spiders are poisonous and some authorities say all spiders are poisonous, but only a few spiders have venom and fangs strong enough to be harmful to humans.
  
• A spider does not chew its food. It bites its prey and the venom injected into the prey paralyzes or kills it prey. The digestive effect of the venom turns the tissue of the prey into a liquid which is then sucked up into the spider’s stomach. Spiders are able to turn insects into a kind of soup as they are only able to eat liquids.
  
• Spider legs are covered with hairs that serve as sense organs. The hairs pick up vibrations and smells from the air. Spiders have at least 2 claws at the end of each leg. These claws allow them to climb glass. Web builders have 3 tiny claws at the end of each leg and they hang onto their web with the middle claw.
  
• The chelicerae are two small organs near the mouth that are used to grab and kill prey. Each chelicerae has a hollow fang at its end. The chelicerae of most spiders move from side to side, but tarantulas move up and down.
  
• Spider droppings are white and are called guanine.
  
• Molting is an important part of every spider’s life. The exoskeleton does not grow and must be shed and replaced by a larger exoskeleton. The new skeleton forms inside the old one. The outer exoskeleton pops open and the spider climbs out in its new exoskeleton.
  
• Jumping spiders have the best eyesight of all spiders. They can see 4-12 inches away. Most web-building spiders have poor eyesight and rely on web vibrations.
  
• Web weaving spiders use webs to trap insects. The shape of the web varies with species. Some build orb webs, funnel, sheet, dome, mesh or tangle types of web. Some spiders do not make webs.
  
• Venom from the Black Widow spider and the Brown recluse spider is made up of protein compounds. Black widow venom is 15 times more potent than the venom from a Diamondback Rattlesnake, but they inject only a tiny amount of venom. Very few people die from a bite of a Black Widow spider.
  
• Some orb weaving spiders put a special design in the center of the web, with a thicker silk. This is called a stabilimentum. It gives off ultra-violet rays which attract insects, allow birds to see the web and often hides the spider in the middle of the web.
  
• Spiders are carnivorous predators.
  
• Web weaving spiders build 4 basic web types: orb, tangle, sheet and funnel.
  
• The most dangerous spider in the world is the Australian Funnel Spider.
  
• Baby spiders are called spiderlings. They break out of the egg case using an egg tooth on the pedipalp. There may be 500 spiderlings in an egg case. They remain in or around the egg case until they have molted one time. Some spiderlings will prey upon others in the egg case.
  
• Many young spiders leave the place of their birth by ballooning. They climb to a high place, tip their abdomen upward and release a strand of silk. They continue to let out silk until the breeze picks the silk strand up and pulls the spiderling along in the breeze. Spiderlings have been seen 20 miles out to sea and 3 miles high.
  
• The "6 S’s of Silk" or how spiders use silk are: signal threads, spirals, snares, shelters, safety lines and sacs for eggs.
  
• Sex of a spider can be determined by the size of the pedicel, the junction of cephalothorax and abdomen. In other words it is the spider’s waistline. The female will have a broad pedicel while the male’s will be more slender. The male will have club shaped pedipalps and the female will be slender and stick like.
  
• Enemies of spiders are: humans, weather, frogs, toads, lizards, birds, shrews, hunting beetles, ants, centipedes, parasitic flies, wasps, fungus and other spiders.
  
• Most spiders have a patterned abdomen.
  
• Cobwebs have been used for dressing wounds. It seems to have an anticoagulant in the silk.
  
• Baby spiders are colorless.
  
• The laceweb spider has no poison glands so it wraps its prey in silk, a very fluffy silk which it combs out with its back legs.
  
• Wandering spiders trail a safety line behind them as they travel and anchor it down periodically. When they return they recycle the silk by eating the safety line. This helps them produce more silk.
  
• Spiders are fascinating animals.
  
• Common Florida spiders are jumping spiders, crab spiders, golden silk spiders, spiny orb weavers, argiope spiders, lynx spiders, wolf spiders, orchard spiders and long jawed orb-weavers. The most venomous spiders in Florida are the Southern Black Widow spider, Brown Widow spider, Red Widow spider and the Brown Recluse spider.