Anthropod Community Associated with the Webs of the Subsocial Spider Anelosimus Studiosus

Anelosimus studiosus (Theridiidae) is a subsocial spider that has a diverse arthropod fauna associated with its webs. From south Georgia, I identified 1006 arthropods representing 105 species living with A. studiosus, and 40 species that were prey items from 250 webs. The arthropods seen in A. studiosus webs represented a distinct community from the arthropods on the tree. I found that Barronopsis barrowsi (Agelenidae) and Frontinella pyramitela was similar to A. studiosus in web structure and that B. barrowsi webs contained multiple arthropods. Also, previously known as asocial, B. barrowsi demonstrated sociality in having multiple adults per web. Lastly, the inquiline communities in the webs of A.studiosus and B.barronopsis contained many different feeding guilds, including herbivores, omnivores, generalist predators, kleptoparasites, and aranievores.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Science in Biology (M.S.)

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis (open access)

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Department of Biology

Year dc:date.available

2008

Author dc:creator

• Mock, Sarah Natalie

Contributors dc:contributor

• Lance Durden
• Jonathan Copeland

• ETD
• Community
• Sociality
• Georgia
• Anelosimus
• Aspidoscelis

Repository record dc:identifier

https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/etd/702

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu:etd-1702