Science Fair Project Encyclopedia
Linyphiidae
| Bowl and doily and dwarf spiders | ||||||||||||
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| many, see text |
The bowl and doily and dwarf spiders, also known as money spiders (family Linyphiidae) include nearly 4250 species in over 550 genera worldwide. This makes the family the 2nd largest known after the Salticidae. New species are still being discovered throughout the world, and the family is poorly known. Because of the difficulty in identifying such tiny spiders, there are regular changes in taxonomy as species are combined or divided.
Common genera include Neriene, Lepthyphantes, Erigone, Eperigone, Bathyphantes, Troglohyphantes, the monotypic genus Tennesseellum and many others. These are among the most abundant spiders in the temperate regions, although many are also found in the tropics. The generally larger bodied members of the subfamily Linyphiinae are commonly found in classic bowl and doily webs or filmy domes. The usually tiny members of the Erigoninae are builders of tiny sheet webs. These tiny spiders (usually 3 mm or less) commonly balloon even as adults and may be very numerous in a given area on one day, only to disappear on the next. Some males of the erigonines are very strange, with their eyes set up on mounds or turrets. This reaches an extreme in some members of the large genus Walckenaeria, where several of the male's eyes are placed on a stalk taller than the carapace!
These spiders are known in the United Kingdom as money spiders, from the superstition that if such a spider is seen running on you, it has come to spin you new clothes, i.e. bring you financial good fortune.
The spider pictured below is Florinda coccinoa. Her eyes are very difficult to see unless the photograph is carefully manipulated.
Some representatives
External links
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