Thanks to their garish yellow, white and black stripes and substantial 7cm leg span, female wasp spiders pack quite a visual punch.
They mature in August and September, when their webs start appearing among long grass.
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By waiting face-down in these structures, they’re perfectly positioned to drop onto their victims – mainly grasshoppers and crickets.
But the puny and comparatively drab male spiders, which sometimes lurk around the perimeter of the females’ webs, are so small they’re unable to tackle prey much bigger than a fly.
Every wasp spider web features an eye-catching patch of thicker zigzag silk, called a stabilimentum. This might seem an odd addition – surely potential prey will see it and thus avoid the web? One possible explanation is that the stabilimentum is there to stop birds from flying into and damaging the web, which takes a lot of effort and precious silk to maintain.
Presumably, insects are unable to spot the stabilimentum in time, or maybe it even serves as a lure.
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