Trapdoor spiders rarely venture far from home, they produce fewer young, and they live, it appears, for decades. One, known as No. 16, was the oldest known spider in the world before its death, in 2018.
.” In one essay, Main writes that to go home on school holidays was “to return to a wild, lonely, forgotten piece of unwanted ‘useless’ land.”
The following year, Main found and marked three dozen more, including, on June 22nd, the new burrow of spiderling No. 16. In short order, Main identified the burrow from which each spider had likely originated and assembled a family tree going back several years. Once a female has mated, she retreats into her burrow to lay her eggs and tend the resulting brood; they remain there together for more than a year, the burrow plugged shut with mud against intruders.
A trapdoor spider confronts many hazards—drought; heat; predation by birds, frogs, lizards, and scorpions; quails scratching in the leaf litter; echidnas rummaging in the soil; ornery older spiders and cannibalistic young ones. Main estimated that only twenty per cent of a given cohort of spiderlings manage to establish nests, and less than four per cent survive into adulthood. But those that do can live for decades. “It seems that most adult spiders probably die of ‘old age,’ ” Main wrote.
For Mason, No. 16 and her kin offer a lesson in sustainability. A long life, a slow metabolism, relatively few progeny, and a frugal approach to the environment—these are the key to living in, and supporting, a diverse and stable landscape. “Humans tend to just go through and change things without understanding the broader implications of doing so, especially in the Wheatbelt,” she said. “I totally advocate living in burrows, hobbit-style; I’d totally do that.
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