Years ago, I heard that the silk of this Nephila had been used as cross hairs for WW2 rifles, so for one of my son's dreaded middle school science projects, I helped him (hey, isn't that what all parents do?) design a plan to test the relative strength of spider webs. We carefully gathered the dragline silk -- the silk that forms the web's structure -- of different species, including the golden orb-weaver. The silks were taped to a bar and lead fishing weights were attached until the silk snapped. I don't remember all the details, but the Nephila was vastly stronger than anything else, and I have a vague memory that we were able to attach 26 weights before it finally snapped.
It was a cool project. Feel free to use it!
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5 comments:
What a cool science project that must have been! Great idea! I have seen the Golden Silk Spider clean out her web that way here in my garden. She is a beauty and a very interesting creature!
I have a new appreciation for spiders now. She's obviously not putting up with such nonsense.
Beautiful spider. I used to have them(or a similar species) here in my garden in Houston, but they all mysteriously disappeared. They've never been back.
I know first hand how strong the web is; as a 10-year old I walked right into one and I pulled and pulled to get them off. Fortunately, the orb that owned the web had crawled up onto a branch. Nice post.
David/ Tropical Texana :-)
@FG: We had the most "fun" collecting the silks; that was a whole other project!
@Susan: I appreciate them, too, but I do not want one crawling on me...
@David: I've only ever found one in my garden and it too disappeared. There was a large hole in her web and I think something (bat? bird?) got her.
Incidentally, based on this post, my nephew in the UK isn't sure he wants to visit us.
when we lived in South California(28years+ ago) I had instructed Nick to watch for black windows before putting his little hands in holes. The silk of the web seemed particularly resistant, easy to identify.
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