Submitted by Anonymous on Wed, 06/06/2012 - 20:45
Forums
Predatory Spiders in the Arctic Food Web

Hi, I have a couple questions on the arctic wolf spider, I am writing this on my IPhone, so please excuse me if the info was on this site and I didn't see it. I work near the Colville River Delta on Alaska's north slope. On Monday while doing pipeline inspections, we found a spider at the shoreline of Harrison bay. We had no idea spiders even existed that far north. So we wer wondering, how do they survive the winters? Do they bite? Poisonous? It seams like the Mosquito season lasts maybe a month, so do they eat anything other than insects? ( vegetation) Thanks, Pat

Tue, 06/12/2012 - 11:06

Nick LaFave

Hi Pat,That's a great question that I don't know the answer to. I'm looking into how the spiders survive winters. I'll ask my team and we should have a better answer for you soon. I didn't want you to think I was ignoring your question though. I'm curious, how did you find our web page?

Tue, 06/12/2012 - 11:54

Nick LaFave

Good news! We handle the spiders frequently and have never experienced a bite, and they are certainly not poisonous. The answer to how they survive the winter isn't so straight forward. Some invertebrates (essentially animals without backbones) have antifreeze proteins that allow them to cope with the extreme and long winters. Duman et al. were the first to find a wolf spider with an antifreeze protein. This indicates an adaptation in this particular wolf spider that doesn't allow the water in their bodies to crystallize. The antifreeze proteins lower their freezing point (similar to the antifreeze in your car). However, we're not sure if all species of wolf spider have this protein. So, we're really not sure how they survive winter. They might go into some state of dormancy and/or produce these antifreeze proteins. Thanks for such a great question!

Wed, 06/13/2012 - 21:45

Anonymous

Thanks Nik, I found your site by googling arctic spiders, then it went to the arctic wolf spider, then your site came up under that search. Thanks for the info,Pat