While some animals are finding the warming global environment a problem, spiders, apparently, are not. In fact, if this report in the Independent is accurate, it may not be cockroaches who inherit the earth, but British immigrant spiders.
Any arachnophobes should look away now. It has emerged that numerous species of non-indigenous spider, some venomous, are spreading across England at an alarming rate thanks to rising temperatures.
The problem has become so acute in some parts of the country that people are beginning inundate experts with worried calls about a host of frightening-looking species that have started turning up in their gardens and houses …
One such species, Steatoda paykulliana, used only to be found on rare occasions in imported goods but has now created colonies in and around Plymouth. Part of the false widow spider family, it is distantly related to the black widow that, on occasion, can administer a fatal bite.
Frequently mistaken for the more dangerous black widow spider, Steatoda paykulliana is part of the false widow family and has created colonies in Plymouth. It is mildly venomous and can deliver a nasty bite, likened to a bee sting.
Of course, this is precisely the inverse of the species loss being experienced on continents like our own. You’ll remember this from only a few weeks ago:
The biodiversity “bible” is the work of 1700 experts, and scientists who took part say it will make for grim reading. The 2007 edition already shows more than a third of 41,000 species surveyed face extinction: one in four mammals, one in eight birds, one in three amphibians, and 70% of plants.
More than 8000 ministers, UN officials, NGOs, scientists and business chiefs will be in Barcelona, Spain, for the World Conservation Congress, held every four years. The release on Monday of an update of the Red List, the global standard for conservation monitoring, will include the most comprehensive study made of the survival status of Earth’s more than 5000 mammal species.
Our closest evolutionary cousins, primates, are especially vulnerable. Hunted for food and traditional medicines, their habitat dwindling, more than 70% of known species in Asia, for example, are under threat.
A planet out of balance? You bet. This sort of thing must play havoc with the foodchain, which itself has huge implications for the habitats of these critters, those who rely on eating them and those who rely on being eaten by them.
Does anyone know of any bugs which have hitchhiked their way to Oz only to prosper as the continent gets dryer and hotter? Is the UK spider story being replicated here?
