Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- How this book came about
- 1 Introduction: spider biology
- 2 Flexibility in the foraging strategies of spiders
- 3 Spider webs: evolution, diversity and plasticity
- 4 Flexible use of anti-predator defences
- 5 Communication
- 6 Deceptive signals in spiders
- 7 Mating behaviour and sexual selection
- 8 Group living in spiders: cooperative breeding and coloniality
- 9 Plasticity, learning and cognition
- 10 Kleptoparasitic spiders of the subfamily Argyrodinae: a special case of behavioural plasticity
- Index
- Plate section
- References
1 - Introduction: spider biology
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- How this book came about
- 1 Introduction: spider biology
- 2 Flexibility in the foraging strategies of spiders
- 3 Spider webs: evolution, diversity and plasticity
- 4 Flexible use of anti-predator defences
- 5 Communication
- 6 Deceptive signals in spiders
- 7 Mating behaviour and sexual selection
- 8 Group living in spiders: cooperative breeding and coloniality
- 9 Plasticity, learning and cognition
- 10 Kleptoparasitic spiders of the subfamily Argyrodinae: a special case of behavioural plasticity
- Index
- Plate section
- References
Summary
The introductory chapter has been written especially for readers unfamiliar with the finer details of spider systematics, terminology and biology. The introduction is by no means intended to be a complete account of spider biology, which can be found in the excellent Biology of Spiders by Rainer Foelix (1996). Instead, here we concentrate on those aspects of spider biology that prepare the reader for the behavioural chapters to follow. The sections on systematics, fossil record and evolutionary milestones will help place the various behaviours discussed into an evolutionary context. The biology section will familiarise the reader with the spider-specific terminology and reveal some of the peculiarities of spiders: did you know that in modern spiders females have two separate copulatory openings and that spiders can produce up to seven different types of silk? For readers already familiar with spiders, the introduction offers a succinct and up-to-date summary of spider biology.
Scope of this book
The aim of this book is to illustrate the incredible diversity and often bewildering complexity of spider behaviour. Researchers that regularly work with spiders are well aware of their behavioural potential, and yet spiders still surprise us constantly with behaviours and phenomena that are intriguing, often bizarre and uncommon in other animals. Here we aim to enthuse readers that may have not considered spiders as models for behavioural studies, perhaps assuming that they are limited in their behavioural repertoires.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Spider BehaviourFlexibility and Versatility, pp. 1 - 30Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2011
References
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