Al Abbasi
Checking the Weather
Spiders love to fly. Hundreds can touch down in an acre of land on a day when conditions are right. And before casting out a silk thread and swooping miles through the air, a spider checks the weather just as a human pilot might do during a pre-flight routine, a new study finds.
Called ballooning, a spider's mode of transport involves casting out a "dragline" of silk thread, which gets carried by the wind, along with the attached critter. Since wind is the fuel and sunshine leads to updrafts helpful for take-off, scientists figured sunny, windy days would make for perfect ballooning conditions.Live Science
Checking the Weather
Spiders love to fly. Hundreds can touch down in an acre of land on a day when conditions are right. And before casting out a silk thread and swooping miles through the air, a spider checks the weather just as a human pilot might do during a pre-flight routine, a new study finds.
Called ballooning, a spider's mode of transport involves casting out a "dragline" of silk thread, which gets carried by the wind, along with the attached critter. Since wind is the fuel and sunshine leads to updrafts helpful for take-off, scientists figured sunny, windy days would make for perfect ballooning conditions.Live Science