Spiders are arachnids that belong to a class of arthropods such as ticks, mites, and ticks, and their anatomy includes many characteristics that are closely shared. While there are more than 40,000 species of spiders globally, understanding their particular anatomy, behaviors and traits can be quite challenging. Everything about these fascinating creatures causes a lot of curiosity, which results in several questions about them.
So, do spiders have noses? Although spiders are closely similar to other animals in their general anatomy, they don’t have a nose, like many other creatures. While humans have noses that are used to smell and breathe, spiders have a network of hollow hair-like structures on their legs that are used for the sole purpose of smelling and recognizing different scents. The hairs work by breaking down the unique chemical composition of a particular scent for the spider to identify a specific. With such ability, the spider can locate a particular scent as predator or prey.
Although spiders can easily smell and breathe without a nose, there are numerous questions about how they breathe and detect scent. This article will delve closely into the spider’s anatomy, specifically how they can breathe and smell without a nose. Read on to find out more.
Do Spiders Smell?
Since spiders have poor eyesight, they strongly rely on other senses to help them identify their surroundings and prey and predators. However, considering they don’t have noses, many people are left wondering whether spiders can pick a sense.
Spiders don’t have human-type noses, but they have a keen sense of smell and can pick up scents quite accurately. Actually, spiders are the only invertebrates with a complete olfactory system and have a good understanding of smell. Although actual smelling in spiders has other to do with noses, they strongly rely on multiple porous structures around their body in the form of small hairs.
In spiders, most of the smelling are done by particular organs filled with hairs found on both sides of their mouths. These fine hairs allow them to easily smell objects by breaking down their unique chemical composition to get that particular scent. As if that’s not enough, the delicate strands come in handy to help spiders identify any potential prey, such as insects that might be caught in their web.
Spiders have a powerful sense of smell, and they can use it to identify any other spiders around them, including mates. Usually, male spiders venture out to look for mates (who typically remain in their habitats) by detecting their scents using the fine hairs on their bodies.
Simultaneously, spiders can notice whether there are other male spiders within a female spider’s vicinity when looking for a mate. They do this by giving off a type of chemical that other spiders can pick up. Apart from identifying other male spiders near a particular female spider, these chemicals also serve as a type of warning to other male spiders that they are approaching a habitat that is already occupied.
Do Spiders Have Noses on Their Feet?
It’s pretty clear that spiders don’t have noses but have a well established olfactory system and a powerful sense of smell. However, one of the most unraveling questions about spiders is whether they have noses on their feet. With many animals having an anatomy that includes noses on their heads, determining whether spiders have noses on their legs can be quite intriguing.
Spiders don’t have noses on their feet, but they use specialized hair on their feet to pick up scents. Spiders smell by touching things with their limbs. This is not to say that they have noses on their legs. Contrary to common belief, spiders have specialized hairs along their legs that help them to smell.
While the process of picking up scents through these hairs may seem complicated, they work by picking up the different chemical compositions of different scents and breaking them down to identify the particular scent. Through these hairs, the spider can pick different scents with its environment and identify any potential prey and predator.
How Do Spiders Breathe?
We have already established that spiders don’t have noses at all. This fact raises another crucial question: how do they breathe without noses?
Spiders breathe through a slit that is found in their fat tummy. The slit serves to allow air into the spider’s body through a dense network of tubes that feed oxygen to cells in the spider’s body. Like any other animal, these tubes are connected to minute nerves that link the cells to the spider’s brain. Simply put, the slit serves the purpose of a nose as it directs air to the spider’s lugs through a specialized channel.
Let’s take a closer look at the body parts that help spiders to pass in oxygen and release carbon dioxide from the cells.
Tracheas
In mammals and other animals with a nose, oxygen is transported to the lungs through the nose and mouth. The oxygen passes through the trachea that connects the nose to the lungs. Since spiders lack noses, oxygen is taken in through the specialized hairs found on their limbs, through the trachea, and into the lungs. Ideally, the tracheas of spiders are found beneath the spider’s stomach in the form of a slit.
Book Lungs
Unlike the normal human lungs, spiders have lungs that are referred to as book lungs. Ideally, book lungs are hollow structures that are closely similar to leaves and function by allowing blood and oxygen flow to the spider’s body cells. The book lungs are situated in a gaping space and are connected to tracheas on one side.
It’s worth noting that a spider can have one or two book lungs depending on the particular species. However, a spider’s evolution status will also determine the number of book lungs it has. Typically, a more evolved spider will often have one book lung instead of a more primitive spider with two book lungs.
How Strong Is a Spider’s Sense of Smell?
Considering the fact that spiders lack noses, you would expect a spider to have a weak sense of smell. After all, the nose is the main olfactory organ that is crucial in determining whether a creature will have a strong or weak sense of smell.
Even without a nose to pick up different scents, a spider has a strong sense of smell. With a well developed olfactory system, coupled with cuticular hairs found on their legs, you can expect a spider to smell quite well, compared to many creatures of its group. Some spiders, such as the cupiennius, have an extreme sense of smell that can be attributed to thousands of hairs that are not only found on their legs, but also on the entire exoskeleton.
A spider’s sense of smell is essential for many reasons. Top among them is that a strong sense of smell is crucial for breeding. Since females often remain in their habitats and secrete a specific scent, male spiders can pick the scent to find the potential female mates by following the female spider’s subtle scent. Once the smell is produced, it is picked up by the hairs found on the spider’s body, making the male spider venture out and follow the scent until it finds the suitable mate.
Additionally, spiders use their strong sense of smell for territorial purposes. A handful of spiders secrete a territorial scent (that’s very different from mating scent) to warn other male spiders that are approaching a particular territory. As such, the strong sense of smell plays an integral role in helping spiders avoid any unnecessary conflicts and protect themselves from any potential attacks.
What Smell Do Spiders Hate?
The vast majority of spiders are harmless creatures and tend to spend time in the dark aloe. While they don’t have any physical noses, spiders tend to have a definite sense of smell. Due to this, they tend to hate particular smells, just like any other creature.
There are many different smells that spiders hate, with the scent of garlic topping up the list. However, there is no specific scientific research to quantify why this common spice is known to have a smell known to irritate spiders. Another scent that is known to irritate spiders is that of chestnuts. There has been actionable evidence that confirms spiders hate the smell of chestnuts. Another scent that spiders mostly hate is that of vinegar.
However, vinegar only irritates a specific species of spiders. Since vinegar smell can only irritate a spider once it’s poured or sprayed on, the spider’s size will also be instrumental in determining the levels at which a particular spider will be irritated by the smell.
Can spiders see at night?
There are close to 40,000 species of spiders on earth. While getting to identify a specific species of spider can be daunting, you can quickly identify a spider by not only counting the number of eyes they have, but by looking at how the eyes are arranged as well. A Wolf Spider, for example, has three rows of eyes, with the first row having characteristically small eyes, the second row has two large eyes, and the last row having two medium-sized eyes.
Even though they are nocturnal creatures and have more than eight eyes, spiders generally have poor eyesight. Spiders can’t see well at night but can use their eyes at night to detect any motion whenever there’s light present, allowing them to effectively move and make sense of their visual impressions during the night.
To detect the presence of any obstacles or prey in their environment in the dark, spiders strongly rely on their smell and other senses.
Read on to learn more about spiders and whether they can use their eyes in the dark and whether they are attracted to light or darkness.
What Do Spiders Do in the Dark?
It’s highly unlikely to see spiders scurrying around or waiting for their prey in the dark, only for it to disappear once the light is shone on it or the sun comes up. Spiders often retreat to a dark spot where there is no light, until they are comfortable that it’s safe to emerge and continue hurting for their prey.
Spiders always hide in the dark for the fear of being attacked by predator animals. This is also a strategic move that serves to help spiders hunt for prey without exposing themselves. Like many other animals out there, spiders can quickly become prey to different animals such as birds or insects. It’s for this reason that spiders prefer to keep a low profile in the dark.
After all, why should a spider risk becoming food to another animal when it can merely weave silk in the night and wait for its food to come by? While this is one of the main reasons that a spider will spend most of the time in the dark, minimizing the risk of being spotted by humans or other animals is one reason why a spider will spend its time in the dark.
There are myriad other reasons why a spider will prefer to spend most of the time in the dark, despite having poor eyesight. For starters, spiders need to ensure that their eggs are safe and will survive the gestation period. This also applies to a pet spider in your home.
Spiders will often look for a secluded place that is hard to reach by anyone or any prey to lay their eggs. These places can be in the attics, in the basement, and behind your furniture, among many other hard-to-reach areas.
Another reason why spiders spend most of their time in the dark is that they are cold-blooded creatures, and they don’t need any warmth to function physiologically. Due to this, they aren’t attracted to light for any particular reason.
Therefore, regardless of whether you have an outdoor or an indoor spider, keep in mind that it will try to avoid any form of light and heat at any cost. Since they always have poor eyesight, the presence of heat will probably give them the impression that they are in the light, and if they can be seen, they can be prey for any other animal that can see them.
Do Spiders Know When You are Looking at Them at Night?
For tiny crawling creatures such as a spider, survival is of utmost importance. They need to quickly adapt to their surroundings to avert prey, such as predator insects and larger animals, adverse climatic conditions, and ravages of time. Although spiders have poor observable habits, they use their senses of smell and touch to notice that you are close by?
Since spiders have poor vision, they cannot know that you are looking at them during the night. It’s no secret that spiders are often active during the night, making you believe that their eyes have some light-vision abilities. However, although most spiders have about eight eyes, they cannot see well during the night and may not even realize that you are looking at them during the night.
Even though there are a few exceptions to this case, spiders generally have lousy eyesight and may not realize that you are looking at them during nighttime, let alone during daytime.
Since spiders are disadvantaged with poor eyesight, they have others knowing what’s within their surroundings. They often strongly rely on their sense of smell, and their vision will only serve as a backup tool whenever they happen to need it.
Even so, while most spiders can realize when you are looking at them in the dark, some, such as the Wolf Spider, can effectively do this with the help of their eyesight. Ideally, Wolf Spider eyes are well adapted to take in the moon’s light to its retina, making it have a better vision during the night. This ability alone makes the Wolf Spider stand tall among other spiders as one of the best hunters in the spider world.
Another significant exception is the Jumping spider, which unlike other spiders, hunts mostly during the day. Since the spider is well acquainted with hunting during the day, its eyes have evolved to a point where they can easily see different colors, including partially when you are looking at it. Therefore, it’s not uncommon for a jumping spider to run away every time you make eye contact with it.
It’s crucial to keep in mind that there are very few exceptions to whether a spider can know that you are looking at it in the dark. Therefore, if you’re still wondering whether a spider can see you or see in the dark, the answer is always no—most spiders can’t know that you’re looking at them at night.
Are Spiders Attracted To Light or Dark?
Spiders can be found all over the world in basically every imaginable environment. Although they thrive in swamps, forests, hot and cold weather, very little is known about whether or not spiders are attracted to light or dark.
Spiders often prefer to be left alone and are generally attracted to the dark as this provides better protection against predators than a light environment. Even when they build a web to catch food like flies, this web might be built in direct light, but they will always try to hide in a dark area near by.
That being said, some spider species may be attracted to light, whilst others may prefer darkness especially in areas where darkness provides the added protection altogether. While this is the case, you cannot deny that spiders are complex creatures and can exhibit very complex behaviors. Therefore, any preference-whether to go towards shining light or stay put in a dark web- will mainly be due to their evolution or for survival reasons.
It’s no secret that spiders have poor eyesight and would prefer darkness for security reasons. However, two main reasons will make a spider attracted to light. It’s worth noting that these reasons are purely practical and tend to increase the spider’s chances of survival.
Food is one of the main things that will make a spider be attracted to light. Like mosquitoes, hornets, and many other insects, spiders have evolved to use the stars and the moon to navigate their way through the night.
Since the moon and stars are located millions of miles away, they don’t move from a spider’s point of view. For this reason, some spiders will be attracted to the moonlight and come out at night to hunt for food.
Another reason that might make spiders be attracted to light is strategic positioning. Although many spiders like to live in solitude and hunt in the cover of darkness, they are equally opportunistic creatures.
Since most insects would prefer to hang around in heavily lighted places, spiders take the opportunity to set up their webs in such areas for a fast and easy kill. Therefore, by positioning itself strategically for hunting, a spider will often find it ideal for weaving its web in the right place and setting up traps for its meal.
Finally
As we’ve established, spiders don’t have human-like noses. However, this does not hinder the spider from picking up scents for its general survival and wellbeing. The adaptation of their smelling and breathing ability is greatly attributed to lack of formidable eyesight; thus, making them have a keen sense of smell. At the same time, thanks to their trachea and book lungs, spiders do not need noses to breathe well.
With so many spider species out there, getting to know their behavior can be overwhelming. However, spiders generally have poor eyesight in darkness and light. Due to this, spiders often prefer to spend their time in the dark to avoid being preyed on by other animals and insects. It’s crucial to keep note that although spiders spend most of their time in the dark, the dark spots act as avenues for safety as well as strategic hunting locations.
Therefore, since they have poor eyesight, spiders find it difficult to see what’s in their surroundings. Therefore, chances are that the spider won’t be able to see you in the day, let alone during the night.
This should shed way the notion by many people that spiders are creepy creatures and tend to slowly get closer to people before biting. Finally, although little research has been conducted as to whether spiders are attracted to light or not, it’s safe to believe that they tend to move towards light or darkness for reasons related to their survival.
