Web use during predatory encounters between Portia fimbriata, an araneophagic jumping spider, and its preferred prey, other jumping spiders

Abstract

Most salticids are cursorial spiders that prey primarily on insects, but Portia fimbriata is a web‐building and web‐invading araneophagic salticid. When in its own web, in the field, P. fimbriata's prey was other spiders, especially Jacksonoides queenslandicus, another salticid spider that routinely enters spider webs. How P. fimbriata uses its web in predatory sequences with salticid prey was investigated in the laboratory. Besides using the web as a vantage point from which to initiate stalking of salticids seen near the web, P. fimbriata also dropped on draglines to attack salticids walking below the web. Salticids that entered the web were ambushed when they came close.