I found one of my Texas S. triangulosa, Jacinta, in her cage this morning, lying on the floor next to a completely drained and shriveled waxworm, unmoving. I nudged her, and she was lying bloated in a puddle of bodily fluids, dead.
This is not good.
So, like the title asks, can spiders lack self-control to the point that they’ll suck prey dry until they rupture? I may be treading new medical frontiers here.
HAHA ,serves her right ,,,,er i mean how tragic for you .Her 8 eyes were bigger than her belly .
No idea, but it sounds like a good way for a spider to go.
If you’ve evolved to eat when food is available, and availability of food is the controlling factor…
Perhaps splicing in tardigrade genes might help?
Cartomancer:
Then PZ can expose his spiders to radiation!
“Then perforce Morgoth surrendered to her the gems that he bore with him, one by one and grudgingly; and she devoured them, and their beauty perished from the world. Huger and darker yet grew Ungoliant, but her lust was unsated.”
“Of the fate of Ungoliant no tale tells. Yet some have said that she ended long ago, when in her uttermost famine she devoured herself at last. “
from my limited experience with spiders, I have often noticed that they will keep wrapped up bundles of prey kind of stored hanging in the webs and go back to them until there is nothing left to eat. so i wouldn’t think they would eat themselves to death.
They are not immortal and do die and in “the wild” are pretty seasonal. I would think they would be susceptible to various bacteria and viruses and parasites specific to them as well as injuries. Unless many of the other spiders suffer the same fate I would think it an individual case. though there is a large population rather close together with the possibility of contagion being transferred.
uncle frogy
What was the waxworm’s last meal?
No.
Revenge of the waxworms!
Apparently, waxworms are like plastic-eating twinkies…
This reminds me…happy Thanksgiving!
well, that’s concerning…
but, like unclefroggy@7 mentioned, I’ve noticed spiders to “save” large prey items, and periodically return to them over the course of several days.
Hoping it’s just some weird coincidence, and not related to the immediate environment, the food, or other factors that are likely to affect your colony.
As far as the mildly deranged penguin can determine, waxworms neither contain cheese nor are they the larval stage of any known cheese plant. Therefore, she, concludes, the spider was starving, desperate for cheese, and ate a lot of plastic wrapping.