Complete Guide To The Atlantic Purseweb Spider

Atlantic Purseweb Spider Notes

• Atlantic Purseweb Spiders belong to the “Sensing Web Weaver Guild” of spiders (Rose 2022).
  • Unlike orb-shaped web building spiders whose sticky, spiral webs catch and hold prey, Atlantic Purseweb Spiders use their webs only for sensing prey; the webs themselves don’t prevent prey from escaping.
    • As such, Atlantic Purseweb Spiders are very fast sprinters—they have to be or their attacks will fail.
• Atlantic Purseweb Spiders spin build long, horizontal tube webs under leaf litter. One end of silken tube sometimes extends above ground attached to a tree trunk or rock crevice. The spiders camouflage the tubes with soil and debris.
  • The web tubes are flexible but strong. Each individual strand transmits vibrations caused by insects brushing against, or walking across, the tubes.
    • Individual spiders wait inside the web tubes until they sense vibration. Then they dart out and bite the prey through the tube wall.
    • When the prey is immobilized or dead from the spider’s venom, the spiders bite a slit into the tube wall. They drag the prey inside the tubes, and feed.
      • As Mygalamorph spiders, Atlantic Purseweb Spider fangs flip forward and thrust straight down into prey as individual spikes instead of pinching prey between the fangs like spiders in the Araneomorphae infraorder.
    • After feeding, the spider repairs the slit in the tube and relaxes until it senses more vibrations that signal its next meal.
• Individual Purseweb Spiders are known to be long-lived, especially for spiders and other arthropods in general—some females live for 7 years (Bradley 2012).
• Atlantic Purseweb Spiders spend their lives inside their tube-shaped, concealed webs. Only dispersing juveniles and males searching for mates move around above ground.
  • Look for them in deep woods, especially those with dry and sandy or rocky soil.