The Dark Side of Ballooning: Nocturnal Aerial Dispersal in Wolf Spiders from the South American Coastline

Postiglioni, Rodrigo; Aisenberg, Anita; Carlozzi, Ana; Bidegaray‐Batista, Leticia

doi:10.13156/arac.2017.17.6.312

Cited by 10 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…As a positive control of the aerial dispersal experiments methodology, we included the wolf spider Schizocosa malitiosa (Tullgren, 1905). It is a wandering species that coexists with A. lagotis and whose ability to disperse through the air has been previously reported (Carlozzi et al, 2018;Postiglioni et al, 2017).…”

Section: Me Thodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Should I stay or should I fly: Aerial dispersal in a funnel‐web wolf spider from the grasslands of southern South America

Kacevas,

Bidegaray‐Batista,

Gobel

et al. 2024

Ethology

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Ballooning is a mechanism of aerial dispersal present in some groups of spiders. By releasing silken threads that are blown by the wind, spiders can travel long distances through the air. Aglaoctenus lagotis is a wolf spider that lives its entire life associated with a funnel‐web, despite the wandering habit that characterizes species in this family. We can find two forms of the species in Uruguay, one of them a strict inhabitant of grasslands of Uruguay. The high habitat specificity and the spiderlings observed surrounding the maternal web suggest a low aerial dispersal capacity in this species. In this study, we tested whether A. lagotis spiderlings are capable of dispersing by ballooning. We conducted laboratory and field experiments during the day and night, to record the occurrence of ballooning and typical behaviours that precede ballooning. We recorded ballooning both in the laboratory and in the field, and it was more frequent during the day. Although it has been reported repeatedly in species from this family, we never observed the pre‐ballooning tip‐toeing behaviour in A. lagotis. Ballooning was preceded by dropping on dragline, considered a behaviour that could generate aerial dispersion of lesser distance than that generated by the tip‐toeing. In this paper, we shall discuss the implications of this form of aerial dispersal, considering that the species analysed is a web wolf spider.

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Section: Me Thodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Should I stay or should I fly: Aerial dispersal in a funnel‐web wolf spider from the grasslands of southern South America

Kacevas,

Bidegaray‐Batista,

Gobel

et al. 2024

Ethology

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“…Ballooning spiders can travel distances up to hundreds of kilometers (Darwin, 1839; Yoshimoto & Gressitt, 1960). Studies to date have measured pre‐dispersal behaviours such as tiptoeing in field conditions (Postiglioni et al, 2017) or under different lab conditions (Bonte et al, 2006; Yip et al, 2021). However, assessing pre‐dispersal behaviours may not be sufficient for understanding when and why spiders disperse because, though they are correlated with dispersal, short‐ versus long‐distance dispersal decisions may differ and may be caused by different factors (Bonte et al, 2009).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Spider decisions to tiptoe, rappel or balloon can be affected by environmental conditions including time of day, wind speed and temperature (Postiglioni et al, 2017), which may influence both dispersal takeoff success and mortality risks during dispersal. For example, strong winds can carry spiders too far from their optimal habitat, and extreme low or high temperatures may increase the costs of dispersal through increased mortality (Eklöf et al, 2012) and thus reduce dispersal (Massot et al, 2008).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Invasive brown widow spiders disperse aerially under a broad range of environmental conditions

2022

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Spiders commonly disperse on silk lines as juveniles by means of rappelling or ballooning. These modes of dispersal, especially long‐distance dispersal via ballooning, can greatly increase the distance an individual can move and, at the population level, the speed of range expansion and likelihood of gene flow. Nevertheless, few studies have examined how spiders disperse under field conditions, and which environmental and meteorological conditions may affect their decision to disperse. We tested dispersal by spiderlings of the invasive brown widow (Latrodectus geometricus) under field conditions in the Negev Desert of Israel. We documented pre‐dispersal (climbing and tiptoeing) and dispersal (short‐distance dispersal by rappelling and long‐distance dispersal by ballooning) behaviours during the day (n = 147 spiders) and night (n = 171 spiders), while recording wind speed, temperature and humidity. We found that spiders ballooned significantly more during the day (14.3%) compared with 1.8% of spiders ballooning at night. At night, spiders were more likely to disperse in conditions of higher wind speeds, lower temperature and higher humidity, whereas during the day, environmental factors were less predictive of dispersal behaviour. In addition, we found significant differences in the proportion of spiderlings showing pre‐dispersal and dispersal behaviour depending on family line. In conjunction with human‐mediated dispersal, ballooning and rappelling may be an important mechanism of range expansion in the brown widow spider. Understanding the environmental and genetic factors affecting dispersal may lead to better management of invasive species.

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“…Geographical barriers in this case are vast mountain ranges on the border of the Eurasian and North American tectonic plates (e.g., Verkhoyansky, Chersky, Kolymsky ranges). Spiders are capable of dispersal over thousands kilometers by ballooning [64][65][66][67][68] but high mountains can impose a significant challenge for constant gene flow between populations. Thus, divergence between populations is likely to be driven by genetic drift as it is typical for the allopatric speciation process 69 .…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Relevance of ddRADseq method for species and population delimitation of closely related and widely distributed wolf spiders (Araneae, Lycosidae)

Ivanov

Marusik

Pétillon

et al. 2021

Sci Rep

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Although species delimitation is often controversial, emerging DNA-based and classical morphology-based methods are rarely compared using large-scale samplings, even less in the case of widely distributed species that have distant, allopatric populations. In the current study, we examined species boundaries within two wolf spider species of the genus Pardosa (Araneae, Lycosidae), P. riparia and P. palustris. Wolf spiders constitute an excellent model for testing the relevance of traditional vs. modern methods in species and population delimitation because several closely related species are distributed over cross-continental geographic ranges. Allopatric populations of the two Pardosa species were sampled across Europe to Far East Russia (latitudinal range > 150°) and several dozen individuals were studied using morphological characters (morphometry of three measures for both sexes, plus five in males only and two in females only), DNA barcoding (COI sequencing) and double-digest restriction site associated DNA sequencing (ddRADseq). The results obtained allow for changing the taxonomic status of two Far East Russian populations to subspecies and ddRADseq proved to be a powerful tool for taxonomic research despite scarce sampling and inherent subjectivity of species delimitation in allopatry. Overall, this study pleads for both multi-criteria and more population-based studies in taxonomy.

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The Dark Side of Ballooning: Nocturnal Aerial Dispersal in Wolf Spiders from the South American Coastline

Cited by 10 publications

References 26 publications

Should I stay or should I fly: Aerial dispersal in a funnel‐web wolf spider from the grasslands of southern South America

Should I stay or should I fly: Aerial dispersal in a funnel‐web wolf spider from the grasslands of southern South America

Invasive brown widow spiders disperse aerially under a broad range of environmental conditions

Relevance of ddRADseq method for species and population delimitation of closely related and widely distributed wolf spiders (Araneae, Lycosidae)

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