Tag Archives: fireflies

Nocturnal Spiders Employ Captured Fireflies as Luminous Lures to Entice Prey

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Sheet Web Spider Psechrus Clavis is known to utilize the coloration and web of its own body as visual cues to effectively capture and consume insects. Interestingly, it doesn’t immediately eat the male fireflies, referred to as Daifan Lampaloid; instead, these spiders retain them on the web, allowing the fireflies to continue emitting bioluminescent signals for up to an hour. This observation has raised intriguing questions among a research team from Tunghai University, the University of New South Wales, the Sydney Institute of Technology, and the National Museum of Natural Sciences in Taiwan.

Sheet web spider with fireflies caught in the web. Image credit: Tunghai University Spider.

Researcher I-Min TSO and colleagues at Tunghai University documented Psechrus Clavis retaining fireflies on the web while these insects continued to emit bioluminescent light for up to an hour.

They noted that the spiders periodically check for the captured fireflies.

Fascinated by this peculiar behavior, the researchers designed an experiment to see if it serves as a hunting strategy.

The experiment involved placing firefly-like LEDs on the actual sheet spider web, using other webs as controls.

The results indicated that the web with LEDs attracted three times as many prey compared to the control web.

This figure increased to ten times more prey when actual fireflies were visible.

The findings affirm that the presence of captured fireflies enhances the spider’s hunting success.

Researchers also discovered that the majority of captured fireflies are male and likely mistaken for potential mates.

“Our findings underscore the previously unrecognized interaction where Firefly Signals, intended for sexual communication, also benefit spiders,” remarked Dr. TSO.

“This study provides new insights into how sit-and-wait predators can adapt to attract prey, revealing the intricate complexities of predator-prey interactions.”

“This behavior may have evolved in sheet web spiders as a way to avoid the energy costs associated with producing their own bioluminescence, similar to anglerfish.”

“Instead, spiders can leverage the allure of their prey’s glow to attract their own targets.”

Video recordings taken during the experiments show sheet web spiders employing various tactics when interacting with different prey species.

The spider swiftly consumes a moth caught in the web but takes its time with the trapped fireflies.

“The varying treatment of prey suggests that spiders may use specific cues to differentiate between prey species and adjust their responses accordingly,” explained Dr. TSO.

“We hypothesize that the bioluminescent signals of fireflies help spiders to fine-tune their handling behavior towards different types of prey.”

This study was published in Journal of Animal Ecology.

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Ho Yin Yip et al. Visual seduction through bioluminescence of prey seduces waiting predators. Journal of Animal Ecology Published online on August 27th, 2025. doi:10.1111/1365-2656.70102

Source: www.sci.news

Fireflies used as bait by spiders to attract more prey

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A spider engulfs its shiny prey

New Hua Fu

Once the spider has captured a male firefly in its web, it turns the dead insect into food and uses its beacon light to lure in more prey.

New Hua Fu Researchers at China’s Huazhong Agricultural University found that male fireflies (Abscondita terminalis), but females of this species often get caught in the webs of orb-weaver spiders (Giant IsopodHe and his colleagues discovered that the spiders were using the flashing signals to lure the insects into their traps, and they wondered if this was what was luring them. Both males and females of this firefly species use flashing signals to court, with the females’ light shows drawing males to their location. So he and his colleagues investigated how the spiders were using this display of affection.

In farmland in China’s Hubei province, the team conducted a series of experiments on 161 different nests, some with spiders and some without. In each nest, the researchers placed male fireflies, some of which had painted the light areas of their abdomens black with ink. They found that nests that contained both spiders and free-flying fireflies attracted more male fireflies than nests without spiders or nests with only non-flying fireflies.

Also, the male fireflies that were tangled in spider webs emitted a different flash than normal — it was more like a female’s flash, emitting one flash instead of two — but the fireflies that were tangled in spider webs emitted normal flashes.

This suggests that the spiders manipulate the male firefly’s signals to mimic those of females and attract other males looking to mate, the team said. Lee Dae Geum The Hubei University researchers say they don’t yet know exactly how the spiders change the signals of their immobilized prey, but they have some ideas.

“The spider’s venom or the bite itself could lead to changes in the blinking patterns of captive males,” Lee said.

Li is interested to know if other spiders that eat fireflies use a similar strategy: Other animals may use different kinds of signals, such as sound or the release of pheromones, to bait their captured prey, he says.

“[The findings] “Spiders prove once again that they are not passive foragers.” Mariella Herberstein “We are discovering more and more cases of highly complex and selective feeding techniques,” say researchers from Australia’s Macquarie University.

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Source: www.newscientist.com