The creepy way this spider prepares its prey: cooking them in digestive fluids

Spiders are predatory arthropods - eight-legged hairy creatures that have inhabited our Earth for around 400 million years. Most of them possess complex venom systems which they use to overpower, then devour their prey - mostly other arthropods.

But one family of spiders, the Uloboridae, don’t have venom glands. These strange animals have baffled scientists for years - if they cannot produce venom, how do they catch and kill their prey?

A recent study, published in BMC Biology, sheds some light on the mystery.

Unlike venomous spiders, uloboridae spiders capture their prey by ensnaring them - wrapping them from top to bottom in silk strands (up to hundreds of metres per prey), then regurgitating a mixture of digestive enzymes onto the compressed body.

The corrosive digestive fluid immediately begins to break down the victim, and the spider starts ingesting its decomposing meal within a few seconds.

No vemon but just as toxic

A research team led by Xiaojing Peng set out to find out whether Uloboridae spiders “had lost their venom glands while retaining toxin-like genes”. The potent toxicity of their digestive fluids would likely compensate for the absence of venom, ensuring effective prey immobilization and digestion.

The findings concluded that “venom-like components are still present and expressed, specifically in the midgut, the organ secreting digestive fluids”. The discovery suggests that uloboridae spiders may have repurposed venom toxins, integrating them into their digestive system for prey immobilization.

Other species are known to have similar venom proteins in their digestive fluid, including the golden orb-weaver, Brazilian white-knee tarantula and velvet spider, although why these toxins exist in digestive fluids remains unclear.

The study concluded: “In venomous spiders, toxins in the digestive fluids likely act as a secondary mechanism for effective prey immobilization; while Uloboridae have adapted this trait as their primary strategy by dispersing toxic fluids across the prey’s body“.

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