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David and Goliath: potent venom of an ant-eating spider (Araneae) enables capture of a giant prey

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Abstract

It is rare to find a true predator that repeatedly and routinely kills prey larger than itself. A solitary specialised ant-eating spider of the genus Zodarion can capture a relatively giant prey. We studied the trophic niche of this spider species and investigated its adaptations (behavioural and venomic) that are used to capture ants. We found that the spider captures mainly polymorphic Messor arenarius ants. Adult female spiders captured large morphs while tiny juveniles captured smaller morphs, yet in both cases ants were giant in comparison with spider size. All specimens used an effective prey capture strategy that protected them from ant retaliation. Juvenile and adult spiders were able to paralyse their prey using a single bite. The venom glands of adults were more than 50 times larger than those of juvenile spiders, but the paralysis latency of juveniles was 1.5 times longer. This suggests that this spider species possesses very potent venom already at the juvenile stage. Comparison of the venom composition between juvenile and adult spiders did not reveal significant differences. We discovered here that specialised capture combined with very effective venom enables the capture of giant prey.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Y. Lubin for providing us with a collection permit at the Mashabbim sand dunes. We are grateful to G. Corcobado, M. Guererro, J. Král, L. Mestre, and J. Niedobová for help with spider collection in the field, and to L. Sentenská and D. Fridrichová for help in the laboratory. We would also like to thank C. Komposch for his suggestion for the title of this paper. This work was supported by CEITEC project (CZ.1.05/1.1.00/02.0068), CEITEC open access project (LM2011020), and the grant provided by the Czech Science Foundation. SK was supported by the project of European Science Foundation and Ministry for Education and Youth of the Czech Republic CZ.1.07/2.3.00/30.0040 and “Účelová podpora na specifický vysokoškolský výzkum” provided by Ministry for Education and Youth of the Czech Republic.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Botany and Zoology, Faculty of Science, Masaryk University, Kotlářská 2, 611 37, Brno, Czech Republic

    Stano Pekár & Eva Líznarová

  2. Research Group Proteomics, Mendel Centre for Plant Genomics and Proteomics, Central European Institute of Technology, Masaryk University, Kamenice 5, 625 00, Brno, Czech Republic

    Onřej Šedo & Zdeněk Zdráhal

  3. National Centre for Biomolecular Research, Faculty of Science, Masaryk University, Kamenice 5, 625 00, Brno, Czech Republic

    Onřej Šedo & Zdeněk Zdráhal

  4. Department of Agroecology and Biometeorology, Faculty of Agrobiology, Food and Natural Resources, Czech University of Life Sciences, Kamýcká 129, 165 21, Prague 6-Suchdol, Czech Republic

    Stanislav Korenko

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  1. Stano Pekár
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Correspondence to Stano Pekár.

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Communicated by: Sven Thatje

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Pekár, S., Šedo, O., Líznarová, E. et al. David and Goliath: potent venom of an ant-eating spider (Araneae) enables capture of a giant prey. Naturwissenschaften 101, 533–540 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00114-014-1189-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00114-014-1189-8

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