Jumping Spider Prefers Human Blood
Updated May 4, 2024, originally posted on March 8, 2006
Here is a good discovery to use if you have friends that are afraid of spiders and you want to give them an extra scare. In 2006 scientists discovered a jumping spider in South Africa that prefers to eat mosquitoes that have recently collected human blood.
The spider resides only in Lake Victoria in Kenya and Uganda. Like other jumping spiders it catches its prey directly by tracking and pouncing on them. They do not make use of a web.
The research was published in the Journal of Experimental Biology and PLOS One.
The jumping spider (Evarcha culicivora) hunts mosquitoes that have recently eaten. It became known as the first spider to select its prey based on what the prey has eaten. The spider prefers to eat mosquitoes that have recently fed on a vertebrate, such as a human.
Attraction to Stinky SocksA more recent study, published in Biology Letters, found that the spiders have an attraction for human feet. The researchers say, "Test spiders spent more time in the vicinity of a source of human odor (previously worn socks) when the alternative was unworn socks."
The spiders are attracted to the human odor as evidenced by these studies. Thankfully, they only consume human blood indirectly by eating a mosquito that has recently fed on a human. Evarcha culicivora do not have the right type of mouth parts to pierce our skin and withdraw blood.
Locate Prey with AntennaeAn interesting study in 2012 (see EurekAlert) found that the vampire jumping spiders that they can identify victims by using their antennae. This skill helps the spiders identify a blood-engorged female mosquito.
A report in The Guardian notes that the spiders could become a useful tool in the ongoing fight against malaria which is transmitted by mosquitoes.