Nature has once again decided that existing predator-prey relationships were simply not dramatic enough, and has produced a spider in the North Queensland rainforest that hunts its prey using what can only be described as a biological trebuchet.
Meet the newly described ballista spider — a creature that has apparently decided that if you’re going to have enemies, you should turn those enemies into your dinner using their own aggression against them. Its chosen victim? The green tree ant, an insect so notoriously ornery and combat-ready that most other predators take one look and quietly find somewhere else to be.
Not this spider. This spider built a catapult.
Researchers from Macquarie University, publishing their findings in Current Biology, discovered that the spider constructs an elaborate cone-shaped trap made of 15 to 60 bundled silk lines positioned near the ground. So far, so normal. Here’s where things get wonderfully unhinged: the spider then coats the trap with a chemical pheromone specifically designed to make green tree ants furious enough to bite it.
The ant, blissfully unaware that its own outrage is the mechanism of its downfall, chomps down on the silk. The cone snaps taut like a loaded spring, and the ant is flung a full 30 centimeters through the air directly into the spider’s waiting web. The spider, meanwhile, has already retreated to a safe distance, essentially operating a ranged weapon.
This is, by any reasonable measure, the most elaborate lunch preparation strategy in the animal kingdom. The spider has essentially invented judo, a medieval siege weapon, and a lure all in one silken package — and it works exclusively on one species, suggesting this little architect has been perfecting this particular recipe for a very long time.
Nature: still finding new ways to be absolutely unhinged.
*Source: Boing Boing / Phys.org / Current Biology (Macquarie University)*
Original story via Boing Boing
