Spider webs designed for rare but life-saving catches.

ABSTRACT: The impact of rare but positive events on the design of organisms has been largely ignored, probably due to the paucity of recordings of such events and to the difficulty of estimating their impact on lifetime reproductive success. In this respect, we investigated the size of spider webs in relation to rare but large prey catches. First, we collected field data on a short time-scale using the common orb-weaving spider Zygiella x-notata to determine the distribution of the size of prey caught and to quantify the relationship between web size and daily capture success. Second, we explored, with an energetic model, the consequences of an increase in web size on spider fitness. Our results showed that (i) the great majority of prey caught are quite small (body length less than 2mm) while large

SUBMITTER: Venner S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1559834 | biostudies-literature | 2005 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature