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June 20, 2014 12:30 am GMT

Fish-Eating Spiders Found on Every Continent But Antarctica, Study Says

Fishing-spider

Not all spiders catch their prey by spinning webs; a surprising number of arachnids quite literally fish for their meals, snatching scaly animals sometimes twice their size.

In fact, a new scientific review found that fish-eating spiders lurk near rivers, ponds and swamps on every continent except Antarctica. They've lifted small catfish out of marshes in Ecuador; grabbed killifish out of nets in Cameroon; devoured dwarf fish in California aquariums; and stalked hatchery ponds in Oklahoma, continuing to kill fish even after eating their fill.

Arachnologist Martin Nyffeler, of the University of Basel in Switzerland, and fish ecologist Brad Pusey, of the University of Western Australia, pored over scientific papers, citizen reports and photos from around the world and collected 89 such instances of spiders eating fish. Their review was published June 18 in the journal PLOS ONE. Read more...

More about Nature, Fish, Antarctica, Spiders, and Us World

Original Link: http://feeds.mashable.com/~r/Mashable/~3/TJClegXfMi8/

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