Scuba Spiders: Diving Arachnids Can Breathe Underwater

i read this story and thought this is soo cool .

apparently some speices of spiders can breath under warter for extended periods of time and scientists are doing reserach into this and how this is possible .

its awsome how mothernatures little creatures like these tiny guys live their lives .


www.foxnews.com...

Like eight-legged scuba divers, some spiders can breathe underwater using an air bubble as an oxygen tank of sorts. Now, scientists have figured out some of the fascinating details of this arachnid diving bell, including that it can give the spiders more than a day's worth of air. Read more: www.foxnews.com...

i also intend to search for a video to go with this thread a bit later .

enjoy the story i did

OMG I saw this on my twitter feed and thought "oh great now I have to worry about spiders under water."

Is any place safe!!


Actually it's pretty cool they can do this, yet I still don't want to bump into one.

Yeah these guys are pritty kool, I remember seing them on Animal planet

This is common knowledge here in Australia, we get taught as kids to ALWAYS check the bottom & edges of a pool before getting in.

This is especially the case with our infamous Funnel Web Spider. Its a killer & loves to sit on the bottom of pools.

As the photo in the original post shows, they do this by taking a bubble of air down with them, stuck in the hairs of their body. I have no idea why scientists are doing a study on this, just give an Aussy a call & they can tell you all about it.

It is an annoying thing I must admit, on a hot summers day all you want to do is dive in the pool, but you have to spend 10 minutes on the side staring at every inch of the bottom. Ive come face to face with a few under water & its enough to make you reverse real quick.

This is really awesome. There's a scene in the film Microcosmos that shows a spider taking air from the surface, and storing it in a small 'nest', then eating some captured prey in there. It's probably my favourite scene in the wonderful film.

I just found it now. Here it is
Enjoy.

Isn't nature amazing!

Spiders who create their own diving bells.

The red crab spider does this too, in the "pitcher plant" which is a carniverous plant that drowns it's victims before digesting them. The spider, we'll call him scuba steve, waits until the insect drowns and dives to the bottom of the pitcher plant, and retrieves it. No fuss no muss.

Originally posted by SNAFU38
This is common knowledge here in Australia, we get taught as kids to ALWAYS check the bottom & edges of a pool before getting in.

This is especially the case with our infamous Funnel Web Spider. Its a killer & loves to sit on the bottom of pools.

As the photo in the original post shows, they do this by taking a bubble of air down with them, stuck in the hairs of their body. I have no idea why scientists are doing a study on this, just give an Aussy a call & they can tell you all about it.

It is an annoying thing I must admit, on a hot summers day all you want to do is dive in the pool, but you have to spend 10 minutes on the side staring at every inch of the bottom. Ive come face to face with a few under water & its enough to make you reverse real quick.

Funnel webs are a nasty creature, primitive arachnid very aggressive and can bite through
boot leather.

And I thought black widows were bad...

reply to post by Version100


Thanks for the video backup of my claim, you can clearly see the bubbles trapped in it's hairs. That is a female he got, body size is the indicator. I hate the things, our 'version' of the Black Widow is the Red Back. Females have a red stripe, males orange-ish, & as usual the female is fatter.

While Red Backs are bad, their bite is nothing compared to the Funnel Web. Fortunately we are taught as kids to keep an eye out so the number of deaths is significantly reduced.

www.termite.com.au...

Probably of most concern is the White Tail. This thing will hide in curtains, blankets, clothes, furniture, & they love the warmth of being INSIDE a bed. Worst thing is you may never know it is under the sheets with you, let alone the fact it bit you.

This has a necrotic toxin, theres not a lot to be done about it & is the spider I fear most as its 'new' to our watch list & science is still learning about it. A single bite can, I repeat can, lead to horrific skin problems, necrosis. While this fact is not well studied, it is becoming better known. There are some sick photos out there of what this tiny spider can do.

Australia has at least one entry in the top 5 of each category of most deadly: spider, snake, fish, jelly fish, shark, reptile, you get the idea, Ive watched out my window as a spider not only caught in its web, but quickly killed & began to ingest an adult bird about 20cm in length (the bird). We get raised knowing these things, but still, when its 35 degrees the last thing you want to be doing is standing on hot concrete searching for bubble trapping spiders in your pool. We live in paradise, but so does everything that wants to kill you

Your all welcome to visit, but its always wise to have a local give you a few pointers, when an attractive octopus only an inch or 2 wide can kill you in minutes (Blue Ring), best to be safe & ask first.

How can we burn them?? gulp.... if they're underwater!?

This is really amazing

reply to post by SNAFU38


Or come here to NZ, where the most dangerous thing in the wild is probably Ongaonga, a type of stinging nettle

In saying that we now have white-tails here, which can certainly lead to a nasty infection, although most official sources claim they are relatively harmless We also have our own version of the redback/black widow, the Katipo. Bites are very rare though as the Katipo is an endangered species, and mostly lives on sand dunes. Other than these, there is not a lot to worry about creature-wise, and the most dangereous thing would be the environment itself. But as long as you take precautions, you should be alright

reply to post by Curious and Concerned


Hell with that, a Weta bloody hurts.
We had loads of them in twotoe's south auckland when cleaning out the shed.

Originally posted by SNAFU38

Probably of most concern is the White Tail. This thing will hide in curtains, blankets, clothes, furniture, & they love the warmth of being INSIDE a bed. Worst thing is you may never know it is under the sheets with you, let alone the fact it bit you.

This has a necrotic toxin, theres not a lot to be done about it & is the spider I fear most as its 'new' to our watch list & science is still learning about it. A single bite can, I repeat can, lead to horrific skin problems, necrosis. While this fact is not well studied, it is becoming better known. There are some sick photos out there of what this tiny spider can do.

We have a version of that here in the States called the Hobo spider.

Hobo spider... Bad...

They can do some real damage if the wound is left untreated, treatment is
almost always going to be excision of the tissue for a nice deep scar.

reply to post by alysha.angel


Hey Alysha,

Nice thread and it is mazing to see how many different life forms can evolve under such vastly different circumstances!

I came across these critters a couple months ago and thought it was amazing not only for the deep sea enviroment but because of the temp differences.

Sea Spiders

Sea spiders, also called Pantopoda or pycnogonids, are marine arthropods of class Pycnogonida. They are cosmopolitan, found especially in the Mediterranean and Caribbean Seas, as well as the Arctic and Antarctic Oceans

Wiki

Antarctica.co

Spider's the size of dinner plates!! Yuck!!

reply to post by Havick007


wow that is really cool and i must say im impressed with mama nature she never ceases to amaze me .. thank you for the addition to my thread ...

thats gross, i no longer feel like water snakes are my biggest fear... now i have to fear these

that was very interesting but now I will be seeing booger-bears in every corner.
and checking out the swimming pool before the grandchildren get in.

Wow. As much as I hate spiders that is pretty damn incredible.

Nature never fails to amaze me. And that's the way it should be

reply to post by alysha.angel


Hey Alysha, i captured a spider in a jar and kept in there for 5 days with no airholes.... it was still alive after 5 days but i released it as i thought it was a bit cruel..... i was testing to see how long they can live in this air tight jar!!

I thought afterwoods that it just went into Hybernation mode!!

Although I don't suffer from arachnophobia most of my family does but I'd still end up making brown water so to speak if I saw that in bath with me then I'd most likely name the little fella and set him free.