Doggedly searching for the crux of the biscuit.
Everybody should be enjoying our run as top of the food chain while it lasts, because Kriston just sent me a link to one of the coolest things I have ever seen. Something something overlords something:
Entomologists are debating the origin and rarity of a sprawling spider web that blankets a 200-yard stretch of trail in a North Texas park. Officials at Lake Tawakoni State Park said the massive mosquito trap is a big attraction for some visitors, while others won't go anywhere near it.
Spider experts said the web may have been constructed by social cobweb spiders, which work together. Or it could be the result of a mass dispersal in which the spiders spin webs to spread out from one another. Texas Forest Service entomologist Joe Pase said the massive web is very unusual. On the other hand, Texas A&M University professor John Jackman said he hears reports of similar webs every couple of years.
That's all interesting, but you really need to see the slideshow to get a feel for the scale of it.
Wouldn't surprise me if the spiders turn out to be very closely related, so this is similar to the mega, multi-queen ant nests formed by fire ants and by the Argentinian ants that are taking over Europe.
Or it could be climate change ;).
Posted by: TokyoTom at August 31, 2007 03:11 AMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEE!!
Shelob Shelob Shelob Shelob Shelob
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEE!!
At the NYT: "Record-breaking rains that flooded Texas earlier this summer inspired outbreaks of crickets and “webworms,” the caterpillar larvae of the white moth. Mr. Quinn said the rains might have something to do with the web, too."
See? Climate change! Bet no one's added this horror to their cost-benefit calculations yet.
Posted by: TokyoTom at August 31, 2007 11:56 AMOk - add Texas to the list of places I'm never visiting along with the Amazon rainforests and any part of Australia that has those big huntsman spiders. Definite arachniphobe here.
Posted by: Kirsten at August 31, 2007 01:15 PMJesus, it looks like our house. I really ought to dust more often.
On the upside, it'll be awesome at Halloween.
Posted by: bitchphd at August 31, 2007 11:12 PMThey said on the news that it hums audibly from the number of mosquitos trapped inside.
Posted by: heebie-geebie at September 1, 2007 10:13 AMIf anyone caught "The Future is Wild" on Discovery (or Science Channel?) a few years back, they predicted that colonial spiders the size of footballs would farm the last remaining mammals - sort of a small shrew - as food some 50 million years in the future. Looks like they're getting an early start.
Posted by: D. Jay at September 1, 2007 11:51 AMI should add, Texas is much wetter than normal this year. In Austin it rained most of the summer. So we've had population explosions of crickets, flies, and in response, orb weaver spiders. LOTs of spiders.
Posted by: D. Jay at September 1, 2007 11:57 AMit hums audibly from the number of mosquitos trapped inside.
Go, spiders!
Posted by: bitchphd at September 1, 2007 05:23 PMBut we don't so much have the mosquitoes in Austin, since we have the bats.
Posted by: Armsmasher at September 1, 2007 11:21 PMAustin and Texas in general get insane amounts of crickets. Before moving here, I'd never seen a yard boil with crickets when you walk through it, or a swarm of dead crickets outside a building, or see crickets regularly on the tenth floor of a building.
Posted by: heebie-geebie at September 2, 2007 10:55 AMWow, and I thought the front of my house looked bad - until about 4 hours ago. Stephanie had the brilliant idea of using the shop vac to get rid of all those spiders so we could open the windows this evening.
I left the bush dwellers alone, because they do eat a lot of mosquitoes.
First thing I thought was "are those twelve dwarf sized bundles on that uppermost branch?"
Mirkwood, such as.
Posted by: DrFrankLives at September 5, 2007 05:45 PM