1973] 
Ranvousse - — A ranens diadematus 
33 
Maturation 
Between the start of the observations and the time of sexual ma- 
turity (last molt) the mean number of molts recorded for each 
group was: 
set I set II 
FG 
3.25 molts 
3.27 molts 
SG 
4.50 molts 
3.66 molts 
The SG males in set I went through a significantly higher number 
of molts than did the FG males (T = 12, P = 0.05) and reached 
a higher weight (see below). In set II, we had only three SG males 
and one of them did not complete its development, this explains the 
difficulty to obtain a significant difference between SG and FG ani- 
mals in this set. 
For set I the mean time of maturation was 81.6 days for the FG 
spiders and 202.5 days for the SG spiders. In set II maturation was 
reached in a mean time of 78.0 days for the FG males and 163.0 
days for the SG ones. The time of maturation was significantly 
longer for the SG animals (set I: T = 6, P — 0.05 ; set II: 
T = 6, P = 0.01). In addition the time of maturation was sig- 
nificantly longer for the SG in the first set than in the second set 
(T = 6, P = 0.05) . 
The rate of maturation, number of molts divided by the number 
of days necessary to complete these transformations, was significantly 
higher for the FG males than for the SG males (set I: T — 6, 
P = 0.0 1 ; set II: T — 6, P = 0.05). 
The Kendall rank coefficient between the gain of weight per day 
and the number of molts per day was 0.61 for set I and 0.66 for 
set II ( in both P — 0.001). A relationship exists between the rate 
of growth and the rate of maturation which is in agreement with 
the findings of Deevey (1949) with Latrodectus mactans (Fabri- 
cius) and of Benforado and Kistler (1973) with Araneus diadema- 
tus. We may assume that the maturation rate is correlated with the 
growth rate. The mean length of time in days between two con- 
secutive molts was determined. In 3 out of 4 groups, the last inter- 
molt was longer than the other intermolts (table 1); for the FG 
males, this last intermolt was significantly longer than the earlier 
(N — 10, T = 1.5, P = 0.01 ). 
