Spider Webs Cover Dallas Trees - http://clapway.com/2015/08/08/spider-webs-dallas-texas-101/

CATCHING UP WITH THE STORY

When you wake up in the morning to have your cup of Joe before driving to work or just out for a morning stroll, you don’t expect anything. But a suburb in Dallas Texas just got something they weren’t expecting.

In the light of day were the trees familiar to locals, only totally covered in spider webs, like a morbid curtain. The trees covered in spider webs also had thousands of the eight-legged arachnids crawling all over the place.

News broke out about this strange sight in Texas A&M AgriLife. This happened on July 31st, however, more up-to-date coverage can be found here.

SPIDER WEBS NOT SO STRANGE AFTER ALL

Seeing trees covered in spider webs, as it turns out, is no new occurrence for locals; its occurrence is regular in frequency. The last reported incident such as this was back in 2007, creepily near the nearest incident.

The culprit responsible was the Tetragnatha guatemalensis spider that builds huge nests when it deems the weather okay to do so. The range of this spider can be found in Minnesota, Kansas, New Mexico, and Southern California in the States.

AN UNDERSTANDING

So when residents saw the trees covered in spider webs that day in July, no one was seriously, frightfully alarmed. For the spiders, the conditions to build that huge curtains of webs include having lots of small bugs by lakes—so an abundance of food source is a necessary condition for this massive web.

But even though these huge nests occur every now and then, the trees covered in spider webs and just the sight of the huge nests are a rare sight to see. Moreover, you don’t need to use bug spray because this specific species of spider isn’t harmful to humans.

Which is also another reason why there wasn’t a huge concern about the sight but rather surprise, as the spider isn’t aggressive. It may look creepy, but it’s harmless. However, it is a wonder to see the Dallas suburb trees covered in spider webs and awe-inspiring.

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Spider Webs Cover Dallas Trees

Spiders Can Sail and Walk on Water - http://clapway.com/2015/07/04/spiders-can-walk-and-sail-on-water345/

Behold! Spiders can sail!

In what seems like the unlikeliest of evolutions, it has been found that spiders can sail and walk on water. How does it do this, you ask? Well, you only have to remember how it is that spiders can travel long distances, and then you can figure out how they sail the waters like pirates. If you don’t, here’s how.

By using their webs, spiders can sail and walk on water, gliding around in a sort of adapted version of ballooning. The key is to use their legs to move them along by using the wind on the water, and letting the web drag in the water as a weight, holding the spider down.

Study observes behavior of spiders and interactions on water

When spiders sometimes land on water by mistake, what happens to them is a phenomenon several scientists undertook to find out. A study then was put underway, which would observe that spiders both can sail and walk on water. Research was submitted in March earlier this year before it was finally published yesterday with the BMC Evolutionary Biology in all its scientific glory.

So basically, if spiders are going off course from their intended destinations, they can just drop onto a body of water and sail across it to reorient themselves and continue back on course. You can watch an example of spider behavior on water here. The adaptation also prevents them from crashing and drowning in water after a crazed flight.

The potential of the sailor spider

This behavior is a fascinating addition to what we already know about spiders, but also shows us how much our small eight-legged friends continue to surprise us. Scientists had wondered why it was theorized that spiders were landlocked, when they were often found in the middle of oceans or on remote islands. The potential of this ability to navigate the waters can best summed up by saying that it allows the spiders to better control where they are going and also increases their odds of spreading out geographically, without the obstacle of water acting as a concern. In other words, now that spiders can sail, there is no stopping them!

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Spiders Can Sail and Walk on Water