Spitting Spider

Facts about Spitting Spiders, "Scientific name for Spitting Spider Scytodes thoracica". A Spitting spider is a variety of spiders that belongs to the Scytodidae family. There are numerous types of spiders, among which the family of the Spitting Spider is the best recognized. More than 150 varieties of spiders have been found all over the world. This means that the family of this breed of spiders is somewhat associated with the family Sicariidae family, which is commonly referred to as Recluse spiders because of the reason that they are a part of the similar super family.


Appearance of Spitting Spiders

The Spitting spider breed appears with the size, ranging from 5 mm to 9 mm. Similar to other spider breeds, Spitting spider breeds are haplogyne and appear with six eyes, which are prearranged as three pairs. The Spitting Spiders have a carapace, which is in the shape of a dome and in their characteristic marked pattern of dots. The Spitting Spider breed has long gangling legs that are a yellow in color with bands that are brown in color. The body of the Spitting Spiders is light brown in color with a dark brown outline on both the cephalothorax and the abdomen. Both the cephalothorax and the abdomen are identical in shape with a little bit larger cephalothorax.

Features of Spitting Spiders

Spitting spider breeds grab their prey by spitting a liquid that sets on contact into a poisonous and sticky mass. Amazingly, though it is formed in poison glands in the chelicerae, the liquid includes both poison and spider silk in fluid form. The poison-soaked silk not only puts the prey out of actions, such as Silverfish by fastening it, but it also has a poisonous effect, too. These Spitting spider breeds used to sway from side to side as they discharge, grab the prey in a zigzag method, which is in the shape of the alphabet Z. The Spitting Spider creed moves in a zigzag way because each of the chelicerae discharges half of the model. Usually, the Spitting spider breed strikes from a distance, ranging from 10 mm to 20 mm and the entire attack chain is over in some under 1/700th of a second. Subsequent to making the arrest, the Spitting Spiders will normally gnaw the prey with poisonous effect, and enfold it in the usual spider style by means of the silk from the spinnerets.

The muscles in a Spitting Spiders legs pull them inward, but the spider can't extend its legs outward. It will pump a watery liquid into its legs that pushes them out. A Spitting Spider’s legs and body are covered with lots of hair and these hairs are water-repellent, which trap a thin layer of air around the body so the Spitting Spiders body doesn't get wet. It allows them to float, this is how some spiders can survive under water for hours. A Spitting Spider feels its prey with chemo sensitive hairs on its legs and than feels if the prey is edible. The leg hair picks up smells and vibrations from the air. There are at minimum, two small claws that are at the end of the legs. Each Spitting Spiders leg has six joints, giving the Spitting Spider 48 leg joints. The spider’s body has oil on it, so the spider doesn't stick to it’s own web.

Diet of Spitting Spiders

Usually, Spitting spider breeds feed on moths, fish, flies and other pests bigger than its self.

The lifespan of the male Spitting spider breed ranges from 1 1/2 years to 2 years, whereas the female Spitting Spiders live between 2 years and 4 years.

Spiders belong to a group of animals called "arachnids", mites and Scorpions and a tick is also in the arachnid family. An Arachnids is a creature with eight legs, two body parts, no antennae or wings and are not able to chew on food. Spitting Spiders are not insects because insects have three main body parts and six legs and most insects have wings.

The Arachnids are even in a larger group of animals called "arthropods" an invertebrate animal of the large phylum Arthropoda, which also include spiders, crustaceans and insects. They are the largest group in the animal world, about 80% of all animals come from this group. There are over a million different species. There are more than 40,000 different types of spiders in the world.

Spitting Spiders have oversize brains.
In the Spitting Spider the oxygen is bound to "hemocyanin" a copper-based protein that turns their blood blue, a molecule that contains copper rather than iron. Iron-based hemoglobin in red blood cells turns the blood red

Spitting Spiders have two body parts, the front part of the body is called the Cephalothorax-(the thorax and fused head of spiders). Also on this part of the body is the Spitting Spider’s gland that makes the poison and the stomach, fangs, mouth, legs, eyes and brain. Spiders also have these tiny little leg-type things called (pedipalps) that are next to the fangs. They are used to hold food while the spider bites it. The next part of the body is the abdomen and the abdomens back end is where there is the spinnerets and where the silk producing glands are located.

A Spitting Spiders stomach can only take liquids, so a Spitting Spider needs to liquefy their food before they eat. They bite on their prey and empty its stomach liquids into the pray which turns it into a soup for them to drink.

A male Spitting Spider has two appendages called "pedipalps" a sensory organ, instead of a penis, which is filled with sperm and insert by the male into the female Spitting Spider’s reproductive opening.

Spitting Spiders do not have a skeletons. They have a hard outer shell called an exoskeleton-(a rigid external covering for the body in some invertebrate animals). The exoskeleton is hard, so it can’t grow with the spider. The young Spitting Spiders need to shed their exoskeleton. The Spitting Spider has to climb out of the old shell through the cephalothorax. Once out, they must spread themselves out before the new exoskeleton will harden. Know they have some room to grow. They stop growing once they fill this shell. Females are usually bigger than males.