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World's oldest web-spinning spider found |
| TheAllINeed.com/NC&T/UM/ |
The spider, measuring just 2mm long, is the oldest example of a spider to have spun the vertical orb-shaped spider web commonly found in homes and gardens.
The spider is between 115 and 121 million years old. For the first time it dates the orb web-spinning spider family Araneidae back to the Lower Cretaceous period. It also confirms the orb-web as one of the oldest structures used by spiders to capture prey.
Previously, the oldest recorded orb web-spinning spider dated back to the Upper Cretaceous period (94 million year old New Jersey amber).
Dr David Penney, of The University of Manchester's School of Earth Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences, who also holds the record for unearthing the oldest spider trapped in amber (135m years old), uncovered the spider trapped in an amber fossil in a museum in Alava, Spain.
He said: "This find provides the first evidence that all major orb-weaving families had evolved by the Lower Cretaceous period and demonstrates that this prey capture strategy was already well evolved at a time when many of a spider's natural prey like flowering plant pollinating insects did not exist."
The spider was found trapped in a piece of amber held at the Museo De Ciencias Naturales De Alava in Vitoria, Spain. Dr Penney was able to identify the spider as an orb web-spinning spider by examining the spider_s eye arrangement, tarsal claw structure and reproductive organs.
This is the first record of the spider family Araneidae from the Lower Cretaceous and provides the first evidence that all three major orb web-spinning spider families (Araneidae, Tetragnathidae and Uloboridae) had evolved by this time.
Dr Penney's results are contained in the paper: 'Oldest true orb-weaving spider (Araneae: Araneidae),' published in the Royal Society's Biology Letters.
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| About the Author |
ICRC ©2006 All rights reserved
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| Quotes | Figures wont lie, but liars will figure.
General Charles H. Grosvenor.
He thought the formula for water was H-I-J-K-L-M-N-O (H-to-O).
He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts — for support rather than illumination. — Andrew Lang.
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