{"id":16034,"date":"2024-02-25T12:46:27","date_gmt":"2024-02-25T12:46:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/02\/25\/invasive-joro-spider-is-surprisingly-tolerant-of-busy-urban-settings-according-to-new-study\/"},"modified":"2024-02-25T12:46:27","modified_gmt":"2024-02-25T12:46:27","slug":"invasive-joro-spider-is-surprisingly-tolerant-of-busy-urban-settings-according-to-new-study","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/02\/25\/invasive-joro-spider-is-surprisingly-tolerant-of-busy-urban-settings-according-to-new-study\/","title":{"rendered":"Invasive Jor\u014d spider is surprisingly tolerant of busy urban settings, according to new study"},"content":{"rendered":"
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As the Jor\u014d spider continues\u00a0to spread across the southeastern United States, its spindly homes can be spotted almost anywhere \u2014 even on power lines and stoplights hovering over busy roads. <\/p>\n

Typical spiders \u2014 and most creatures \u2014 tend to find the noise and wind disturbance from nearby busy roads to be too stressful, but the Jor\u014d spider doesn\u2019t seem to mind much, according to a\u00a0new study published in Arthropoda\u00a0on February 13. This research could explain why the spiders are regularly spotted in urban areas that native spiders don\u2019t inhabit and suggests the creatures are well-suited to thrive and spread in similar locations throughout the United States. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf you ever look at a spiderweb next to a road, they\u2019re jiggling and shaking, and it\u2019s a cacophony of stimuli. \u2026 Roadsides are a really harsh place for an animal to live. But Jor\u014ds seem to be able to live next to them,\u201d said lead study author Andy Davis, a research scientist at the University of Georgia\u2019s\u00a0Odum School of Ecology. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s kind of unfortunate for us here in the US \u2014 it so happened to be the place where the spider got deposited about 10 years ago, and it just so happens that the (spider) that got dumped here is one that can do really well with humans.\u201d <\/p>\n

Tolerance for being around cars and people<\/h3>\n

Jor\u014d spiders, or Trichonephila clavata, were first spotted in the United States around 2013, according to a\u00a0University of Georgia news release.\u00a0The creatures \u2014\u00a0which grow up to 4 inches (10 centimeters) in length, about the size of the palm of a human hand \u2014 have since spread rapidly across the southeastern states. <\/p>\n

Classified as orb weavers, the spiders catch prey using their giant, three-dimensional webs. The Jor\u014d will sit in the middle of the web and wait to feel a vibration, signifying that an insect has been caught in the sticky trap, allowing the spider to rush down and capture it. <\/p>\n

The researchers behind the new study, including Davis and undergraduate ecology students, conducted more than 350 tests on spiders across 20 roads using a tuning fork on the spider\u2019s web to simulate prey behavior. While the researchers had expected noisy roadsides to interfere with the spider\u2019s hunting abilities, the tests found that spiders near moderate to heavy traffic roads were only slightly less likely to attack the simulated prey than those near low-traffic roads. The spiders near heavy traffic attacked 51% of the time, while those in less busy areas attacked 65% of the time. <\/p>\n

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<\/span> Scientists now think they know why tardigrades are so indestructible<\/span> <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cThis does help us dial in on one potential aspect of this species to look at, because it does kind of set the boundaries \u2014 how far is it going to spread? And is it not going to stay restricted to the South, and in forested areas, or is it going to move into cities where the likelihood of interacting with them between the spiders and humans increases?\u201d said Floyd Shockley, collections manager for the Department of Entomology at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC. <\/p>\n

Shockley, who was not involved with the study, said he was surprised to see only a little more than 10% reduction in the spider\u2019s vibration-detecting efficiency but was not shocked that the species seemed to have a natural tolerance for being around cars and people. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhereas most of the other species like to stick around in the woods, the Jor\u014ds specifically like to move into urban habitats,\u201d Shockley said. \u201cThey\u2019re capitalizing on easy hunting, easy access to prey. \u2026 They\u2019re not particularly interested in us; they\u2019re interested in the fact that we make the condition super easy for them to get the prey that they need to complete their life cycle.\u201d <\/p>\n

Urban life offers a certain ease for the J\u014dro spiders because they seem to prefer making their webs on structures where lights are nearby, such as between buildings or on telephone poles, Shockley said, explaining the light tends to draw in insects they eat. <\/p>\n

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<\/span> Moths actually aren\u2019t drawn to light as previously thought, study finds<\/span> <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The study authors cited past studies that had found roads had a\u00a0negative impact on the abundance\u00a0and diversity of insects, but the Jor\u014d spider, and many of its cousins within the Trichonephila genus, are surprisingly urban tolerant, Davis said, and choose to build their homes near busy areas. <\/p>\n

The researchers said they don\u2019t know why these spiders are better suited to city life than others. But Davis said he is hoping to find an answer with future studies, where he plans to research the physiology of a Jor\u014d spider and the creature\u2019s response to stress. <\/p>\n

\u201cCompared to other spider species, Jor\u014d spiders have this sort of unique way of reacting to stress, behaviorally that is, and we think that this is part of the same sort of thing where somehow these Jor\u014ds are just unique in that they can live in a stressful environment,\u201d said Davis, who conducted a\u00a02023 study\u00a0that found the species is rather timid and tends to \u201cfreeze\u201d when disturbed. The spiders\u2019 shyness might help them endure more urban settings as the prolonged freeze could help to conserve energy, the researchers wrote. <\/p>\n

What to do when you come across a\u00a0Jor\u014d\u00a0spider<\/h3>\n

As the nonnative Jor\u014d spider continues to spread in the region, the spiders pose a threat to native species that are beneficial to the environment. The spiders do not appear now to have a negative impact,\u00a0Shockley\u00a0said, but as they continue to multiply, they could start to displace native spiders as they eat insects the native spiders also need to eat. <\/p>\n

While conducting the study, the researchers found evidence of the Jor\u014d spiders coexisting with native spiders, Davis said. <\/p>\n

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<\/span> Famous fossil is really just paint, rocks and a couple of bones, researchers say<\/span> <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The spider is venomous, but its fangs are incapable of breaking human skin. So while it is advised to kill certain invasive species such as the\u00a0spotted lantern fly, the Jor\u014ds can be left alone, Davis said. <\/p>\n

And the Jor\u014d spiders eat species that are good and bad for the environment, including the infamous lantern fly, he added. <\/p>\n\n

This post appeared first on cnn.com<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As the Jor\u014d spider continues\u00a0to spread across the southeastern United States, its spindly homes can be spotted almost anywhere \u2014 even on power lines and stoplights hovering over busy roads. Typical spiders \u2014 and most creatures \u2014 tend to find the noise and wind disturbance from nearby busy roads to be too stressful, but the <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":16035,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-16034","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16034","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16034"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16034\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16035"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16034"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16034"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16034"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}