Spider webs of the temperate region: a comparative study on the efficiency of prey capture, orientation, size, and height of orb, tangle and sheet webs.

Abstract

Spiders face severe competition among arthropods. For this reason they have highly specialized themselves to capture prey and make a home for themselves using the silk that their own bodies produce. There are three main types of webs made from this silk, orb, sheet and tangle. In my research I tried to answer the following questions; does the web type affect the orientation, height, angle with respect to the horizontal, and surface area? Does web type affect the kinds, amounts and size of prey captured? By taking 60 samples of the three web types and noting the height, angle, surface area as well as the amounts, types and sizes of prey captured. I found that overall orbs are the most efficient with one of the highest mean heights, the largest means for surface area, total prey captured, flying prey captured and small prey (<2mm) captured. Sheet webs had the lowest mean heights and were most efficient at catching crawling prey. These data showed that each of the three web types are specialized to catch certain prey in certain locations allowing the spiders to specialize and become more successful.