What Do Spiders Eat? A Detailed Explanation of Spiders' Main Food Sources

Spiders are the collective term for all species in the order Araneae, class Arachnida, phylum Arthropoda. They are distributed worldwide except in Antarctica. Most have venom glands and feed mainly on insects, other spiders, and myriapods, while some spiders also feed on small animals. Let's take a look below at what spiders eat!

What Do Spiders Eat?

Spiders are carnivorous animals with a broad diet. Their food consists mostly of insects or other arthropods, and they can sometimes prey on animals several times their own size, such as the South American tarantula, which sometimes preys on small birds, rodents, and the like. However, spiders have no upper jaws in their mouths and do not directly swallow solid food. After capturing prey with a web, they first inject venom secreted by the venom glands inside their chelicerae into the captured prey to kill it. Digestive enzymes secreted by the midgut are then poured into the tissues of the prey that has been torn apart by the chelicerae, quickly breaking it down into liquid, which is then sucked into the digestive tract.

Classification of Spider Hunting Methods

1. Web-building spiders: The most important characteristic of web-building spiders is their web-spinning behavior. Spiders secrete mucus through the protrusions at the tips of their silk glands, and this mucus coagulates into very fine silk upon contact with air. The web formed from this silk is highly sticky and is the spider's main means of catching prey. For insects stuck on the web, the spider first injects a special liquid into the prey - digestive enzymes. These digestive enzymes can cause the insect to become unconscious, convulse, and eventually die, and cause its body to liquefy. After liquefaction, the spider feeds by sucking.

2. Wandering spiders: Wandering spiders do not build webs, but instead roam around or camouflage themselves in place to hunt prey, such as the huntsman spider.

Feeding Characteristics of Spiders

1. The corpse-dissolving method: When hunting, a spider first paralyzes its prey with the toxins in its fangs, secretes digestive fluids into the prey's body to dissolve it, and then slowly sucks it up, eating everything clean without wasting a bit.

2. Self-made freshness bags: Spiders are afraid of light and often spin webs facing places that let in light and air. Besides being used to catch prey, spider silk can also be used as a freshness bag. The spider wraps leftover food in the web and saves it for the next meal.

3. Neat freak: Spiders clearly separate the places where they eat, sleep, and defecate. Domesticated spiders generally use the edge of the cage as a garbage station, where they urinate, defecate, and discard food scraps.

4. Modest appetite: Spiders have a strong sense of territory and must be kept separately. They eat only one to two meals a month and can go without food for up to two months. Their food is mainly insects such as crickets and grasshoppers. You only need to place a piece of wet sponge in the cage to supplement their water, and they can be raised to adulthood (about seven years) without changing the cage.