Talk:Woodlouse spider

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 16 August 2021 and 6 December 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): HugginsLogan. Peer reviewers: Nhennum, Gmoore12.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 05:03, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

Untitled

They totally have these spiders in Utah- I've found them on "Utah spiders" pages, and I have them in my house. On the map it says they're not found in Utah at all. This makes me sad. Someone fix it, because it's not gonna be me. --66.7.126.14 05:58, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

If someone (not me) does fix this, can they also add them to the South Island of New Zealand? They are definitely found there, since there was one on my bedroom floor the other night.--Megatronacepticon (talk) 09:54, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

They are in Colorado as well. I've found 2 in my apartment and also found it listed on a Colorado spiders web page. --Striker6879 (talk) 19:29, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

Sorry to comment on such an old discussion (I'm not an experienced Wikipedia editor, so I'm not sure if I should be doing this), but the distribution and the picture still seem to be wrong. Not sure about the rest of the world, but only the eastern coast of the USA is painted green (as well as some isolated spots of the western coast). On BugGuide, there have been registered occurrences on multiple states in the center of the US as well. This is an introduced species, so maybe it has spread more and the map is outdated. DepoisDoFim (talk) 05:27, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

Aggressive behaviour?

Are these spiders usually agressive when they feel threatened? I've always thought they were quite docile, but I was convinced very much otherwise earlier. A small female displayed her fangs quite readily when I tried to coax her towards the door, which certainly surprised me. Edaemus (talk) 09:58, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Selective predation?

I find the lede section contradicts "D. crocata will take other invertebrates, and shows no particular preference for slaters; these are simply the dominant prey in its habitat." Which one is true? FoCuS contribs; talk to me! 17:02, 29 September 2016 (UTC)

It's explained in the article; the spider eats slaters because that's the only thing there is to eat where it lives. It will take other prey in captivity. I don't think there's a contradiction. Giantflightlessbirds (talk) 21:52, 29 September 2016 (UTC)

Yes, there is a contradiction. The very first line of the article reads "The woodlouse spider, Dysdera crocata, is a species of spider that preys exclusively upon woodlice.". Further down the article in the 'Behavior' section, that same concept of exclusive predation is echoed by the sentence "Their diet consists exclusively of woodlice which—despite their tough exoskeleton—are pierced easily by the spider's large chelicerae; the spider is able to inject venom into the woodlouse's soft underbelly while avoiding any noxious defensive chemicals." which is then directly followed up with the sentence 'Laboratory experiments have shown D. crocata will take other invertebrates, and shows no particular preference for slaters; these are simply the dominant prey in its habitat.' which contains the contradicting information. We are given three statements presented as facts in the article. Two of the statements tell us that the woodlouse spider preys 'EXCLUSIVELY' on woodlice while the third statement tells us the woodlouse spider has been known to feed on other invertebrates besides woodlice, and even has no particular preference for woodlice -they are just the dominant prey in its habitat. It is extremely unlikely that the woodlouse is the 'only' prey available to the woodlouse spider with how widespread and varied their habitat is.

Tlhulse (talk) 03:54, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

OK. Here's the section from the EOL entry on this species, which seems clear. Anyone who would like to chase up those references (they're not given on the original page) and rewrite this to clarify its diet, go ahead.

"Dysdera crocata is often said to be a specialist feeder on terrestrial isopods (woodlice). Although it is unclear how specialized this species is in nature (they will take a range of prey in captivity), some dysderid species (including this species) are known to feed on woodlice in the wild and have modified chelicerae and feeding behavior that appear clearly to indicate at least some degree of specialization on these prey (Pollard et al. 1995; Řezáč and Pekár 2007 and references therein; Řezáč et al. 2008)." Giantflightlessbirds (talk) 10:03, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

This article was well-organized and included sections on appearance, distribution, behavior, and scientific classification. . I found it very interesting that it has seven different common names that refer to its prey. I think a section on mating behaviors could be added, because even though this article has a couple sentences on this topic, it should be its own section in order to be better organized and have more detail. There could also be information added on their life cycle, since it is unclear from this article how long they live. It would also be good to include a section on whether they are solitary or social spiders, since this is not included at all in the article and affects how they catch prey and live in general. It has very few references compared to the amount of information it includes. It is rated as low-importance, which I think may not be quite accurate, since this seems to be a fairly common spider that more than just specialists would be interested to know about. Mlschoening (talk) 02:07, 6 October 2020 (UTC) Mlschoening

This page does well with covering a relatively wide span of information on the woodlouse spider, even providing an example of experimental evidence on their feeding behaviors. Also, the page discusses how woodlouse may interact with humans, providing information on possible bites. I found it very interesting how these spiders display such aggressive behaviors when capturing prey and also between males when competing for mates. Although there is a wide span, each bit of information is only discussed at its most superficial level and more evidence and description is needed. Specifically, I would like to see more information about the mechanisms of movement – we are given a description of the appearance, but how are these specific phenotypic characteristics related to the actions of the woodlouse? What is the evolutionary benefit of having six eyes? Is the shiny abdomen due to a coat of wax? Also, within behavior, mating behavior could also be fleshed out. It is interesting how males may inflict injury upon searching for a mate – does this mean that the female woodlouse holds more “power” in mating and is ‘choosy’ with who she copulates with? If males are risking injury in order to propagate their genes, is there some evolutionary stable strategy that exists in male woodlouse regarding mating? Lastly, we are given information about its prey, but I would like to know more about possible predators and how the woodlouse has evolved to evade predators. This page is classified as C-class, which I agree with because there is a lack of references, with only four sources cited. In addition, it seems that some of the information is incomplete, especially regarding the map as discussed by other users. Looking at the references, a broader range of sources would be beneficial in making this map more comprehensive – maybe other than looking at observational studies, could data collected from exterminators be included? Also, state lists of spiders could also be looked at. This page is ranked of low importance, but from the comments it seems that the woodlouse is present in more areas than first believed, so may carry a higher level of importance. Cjing99 (talk) 13:07, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

Size?

The size cited for the female is low according to iNaturalist. Perhaps the North American variant is larger than the UK one? EnchantedElephant (talk) 18:29, 7 May 2021 (UTC)

@EnchantedElephant: if you look at the iNaturalist page, it gives reference 5 as the source, but this is the Wikipedia article. So they seem to be misquoting. An issue often with spider dimensions is whether sources are measuring in the same way. Roberts, like other specialist sources, treats the body length as the distance from the front of the carapace to the end of the abdomen, excluding chelicerae and spinnerets. Peter coxhead (talk) 06:17, 8 May 2021 (UTC)