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To: grey_whiskers

I saw something remarkable at a motel once. It was spring, and there were tons of bugs flying around. It looked like one bug was flying very slowly up towards the roof.

It was stuck to a line of silk, like a fishing line. There was about six or seven of these long loose silk threads hanging down to where the bugs were flying (which was right near a light).

The spiders were steelheading!!

I knew for sure it wasn't an accident when a second bug got stuck in a line and whatever kind of spider was up there started hauling it up.


39 posted on 09/27/2006 10:33:50 PM PDT by djf (BREAKING NEWS: "I just took a dump, Muslims offended!!!")
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To: djf
There's one spider here that does something similar: http://www.amonline.net.au/factSheets/bolas_spider.htm

The Magnificent Spider captures its prey by deception At night it spins a short line of silk with a sticky globule of silk at the free end - the bolas. This sticky silk globule may contain pheromones that mimic the scent of a certain female noctuid moth species, attracting unwary male moths within range (known as "aggressive mimicry"). The Magnificent Spider is very sensitive to vibrations, twirling its thread when it senses the approach of a moth's beating wings. The moth eventually flutters close enough to be hit by and become stuck to the globule. The spider then pulls up the strand, bites and immobilises the moth, and either eats it straight away or stores it for later, wrapped in silk. These spiders can also be induced to respond to the vibrations of plucked guitar strings.

48 posted on 09/28/2006 12:36:07 PM PDT by bobdsmith
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