Kew : Snares or Snap-nets of Triangle Spiders. 



205 



unable to step from one radius to another except near the apex. 

 It will be seen, Wilder adds, that by first making the cross-line 

 nearest the base, and afterwards the others in their order, the 

 spider avails herself of the fact that a less and less distance has 

 to be successively gone over before crossing from one radius to 

 the next; whereas, if she made the shortest cross-line first, she 

 would be liable to entangle the others if she crossed at the apex; 

 or, if she went round by the base-line, the distances to be gone 

 over would decrease inversely to the length of the lines to be 



drawn out, that is, the 

 shorter lines would have to 

 be. carried and stretched the 

 greater distances, and vice- 

 versa; but in the method 

 which the spider adopts the 

 distances, as we have seen, 

 conveniently decrease with 

 the length of the cross-lines 

 themselves. As to the time 

 required for the construction 

 of these lines, Wilder men- 

 tions that those he saw spun 

 (the five lesser ones) occu- 

 pied the creature about ten 



Fig. 5. — The snare oi Hyptiotes cavatus 

 upon the stretch. After Wilder. Popular Science 

 Monthly, VI. (1875), p. 642, Fig. 1 ; Proceedings 

 of the American Association for the Advance- 

 ment of Science, XXII. (1S75), Part 2, p. 267, 

 Fig. 2. 



minutes; the other longer ones, 

 he thinks, may have taken twice as long, so that half-an-hour 

 or more is probably occupied in the putting in of the whole 

 of the cross-lines; during this time, Wilder estimates, the hind 

 legs probably move over the spinnerets not less than 9,000 

 times. 



The manner in which the spider uses the snare is fully 

 described by Wilder, w hose remarks on this part pi the subject, 



1900 July 2. 



