Scientists have discovered a “ballista spider” that builds a spring-powered silk trap designed specifically to catch aggressive green tree ants. The ant unknowingly triggers the mechanism itself, ...

Lead researcher Professor Ajay Narendra said the trap may even be chemically baited.

New spider that hunts dangerous ants using a spring-loaded trap discovered by scientists in Australia - A ballista spider’s trap can launch ants at an acceleration comparable to a severe car crash ...

Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. I write about biodiversity and the hidden quirks of the natural world. There are over 45,000 species of spiders in existence, but ...

A newly discovered spider in Queensland builds a four-hour silk catapult that uses aggressive ants to trigger their own ...

Alaska has no established native populations of medically significant spiders, making it one of the safest U.S. states for arachnophobes. Wolf spiders are Alaska’s most commonly encountered large ...

There’s more than one way a spider can spin its web. Some construct large vertical orb webs, while others build horizontal sheet webs or tangled cobwebs that ensnare crawling insects. There’s also ...

A study from McMaster University in Ontario, Canada, published Monday in Nature Ecology and Evolution showed that Anelosimus studiosus spiders, in particular, have become more aggressive in the wake ...

Each year, thousands of Americans experience spider bites, yet only a small fraction require medical intervention. Understanding which encounters demand immediate attention and which can be treated at ...

Technically, all spiders are at least slightly venomous. However, the vast majority of species in the United States are not considered medically significant. Most cases of spider bites that require ...