Sign In
I dropped a dead fly on a spider's web but the spider didn't eat it even after a few weeks, what reasons could there be for this behavior?
Ad by Review Signal
Sick of fake web hosting reviews?
Review Signal analyzes millions of social media posts to figure out who the best web hosts really are.
Read More
7 Answers
Mark Baker, First Responder for Industrial Accidents (1980-present)
Updated August 28, 2018 · Author has 7.4k answers and 1.4m answer views
Aloha ,
As a single young person , I found out what was going on even before it was reveled on ‘Nature’ . Spiders are tactical creatures , as such they ‘hear’ things caught in their webs . We have very poor eye sight and the scene of swell , so the only way they know something is trapped in their web is by ‘its shaking and wiggling to get free’ and the spider just helps herself to a meal by freeing it .
Most ‘webs’ are clues to the spider’s vision or lack of it . Some have ‘trip wires’ set along the ‘plain ground’ with a ‘throw net’ ready to throw down on any passer by . Others have their web ju
Continue Reading
I've read a few replies to this question talking about the problem being that the fly wasn't alive, suggesting that the spider wouldn't like a decaying creature in its web. I wrote this as a reply to one of those answers, but it ended up being a little long so I thought I'd post it as a reply to the question also. Hope the info helps!
Dead insects & bugs are a part of many spiders' diets: many spiderlings (baby spiders of all kinds) scavenge from dead insects until they're big enough to take on their own prey. Then there are species like the broad-faced sac spider, who quite enjoys dead and dec
Continue Reading
Daniel Ferguson, Was apart of the Field Naturalists Club of Victoria
Answered May 10, 2018 · Author has 191 answers and 75.7k answer views
Because the fly wasn't moving, spiders mainly go for living prey because they use webbing to sense the presence of prey. When a fly naturally gets caught they buzz around and try to escape which moves the web sending vibrations throughout the webbing. The spider then homes in on the source of the movement and hunts it down to eat. If the fly or prey is dead, it cannot move, therefore the spider doesn't really know that it's there to begin with. If you were to poke the fly with a stick or something gently to simulate it being alive when you first placed it in the web, you may have gotten the fl
Continue Reading