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European garden spider — printable fact sheet
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European garden spider
Araneus diadematus
Araneus diadematus is the orb-weaver with a cross of white spots on its abdomen, and it rebuilds its web with a frequency that would bankrupt most animals. The capture spiral is a costly protein, and a web loses its stickiness and its tension within a day or so, so the spider ta…
Did you know?
- Despite their intimidating appearance, the bite of a European garden spider is generally no more harmful to humans than a bee sting.
- Two garden spiders, Arabella and Anita, were flown on Skylab in 1973 to see whether webs could be spun in weightlessness. After some initial confusion, Arabella built a passable web, though the strands were finer and more variable in thickness than on Earth. Studies in which spiders were dosed with caffeine and other drugs produced famously deranged webs, and web geometry is still used as a sensitive bioassay for neuroactive compounds. A garden spider's silk is stronger than steel of the same diameter by weight, and the dragline can absorb enormous impact energy without snapping. The species will readily bite if squeezed but the venom is trivial to humans.
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