Communal questions

[goaethic]

I've seen both parasteatoda tepidariorum and steatoda triangulosa live in close proximity of their own kind and even share webbing outside of my house and there's several tons of them just in the small space of a window, between the mesh and the glass. Are they social, or have the potential to be if prey is abundant enough?

 

[Poonjab]

They will kill each other given time.

 

[goaethic]

They will kill each other given time.

The ones in my window had been there for a long time, probably through several generations.

 

[Poonjab]

The ones in my window had been there for a long time, probably through several generations.

Put multiple is close proximity and see what happens.

 

[viper69]

I've seen both parasteatoda tepidariorum and steatoda triangulosa live in close proximity of their own kind and even share webbing outside of my house and there's several tons of them just in the small space of a window, between the mesh and the glass. Are they social, or have the potential to be if prey is abundant enough?

tolerance for neighbors is not to be confused with communal.

 

[The Snark]

tolerance for neighbors is not to be confused with communal.

Nomenclature and definition issues. Several factors need to be taken into account which is often dependent upon the species. Pholcids give a good example of both.

 

[goaethic]

Nomenclature and definition issues. Several factors need to be taken into account which is often dependent upon the species. Pholcids give a good example of both.

Elaborate?

 

[The Snark]

Elaborate?

I'm only going by in the wild observations here. Others might have the scientific low down.
Latrodectus will occasionally share a guy line, or two adjacent spiders will make double guy lines. They aren't communal - non tolerant.
Some orb weavers share guy lines quite often. One version that makes pie slice shaped webs often are somewhat communal with shared guy lines in nearly every adjacent web. Quasi communal.
Pholcids can be fully communal with a male incorporating adjacent females webs into it's own and keeping a harem so to speak.
Some mesh web weavers are extremely anti communal and always maintain distance between adjacent webs while others They will predate any neighbor that gets too close.
Other sheet web spiders as some Desidae common to Australia and New Zealand are fully communal and add to each others webs making those giant sheet webs
And then you have the full on predators like Salticids that are quite similar to mammalian versions that maintain a territory without webs.

So you have intolerant, predating any neighboring spider of any species, then degrees of tolerance without being communal and on out to fully communal where none of the members has it's own web. Into this mix enters sensory ability and genetic programming. Three opposites are highly capable sensory ability that predates or avoids anything touching their web, poor sensory ability where neighbor incursions get ignored, and in the fully communal they can often tell the difference between their own species, either tolerating or ignoring them. In turn they may share the same food source, or predate each other mistaking or ignoring members of it's own species. The Pholcid harems usually share the same food source.

 

[Albireo Wulfbooper]

I'm only going by in the wild observations here. Others might have the scientific low down.
Latrodectus will occasionally share a guy line, or two adjacent spiders will make double guy lines. They aren't communal - non tolerant.

Dr. Catherine Scott, who studies Latrodectus, has observed semi-communal behavior among mature and immature females of her study species - I believe western black widows. Apparently in some environments they’ll be quite closely clustered, with some limited web-sharing, IIRC. Of course cannibalism does occur in these clusters, but they seem to be relatively tolerant under these conditions. I believe the specific environs in which this has been observed are largely barren beaches with driftwood deposits that the spiders cluster under. Interesting adaptation.

 

[The Snark]

@Albireo Wulfbooper Environmental considerations need to be taken into account everywhere. From spiders to non binary penguin couples, (and of course, the American Hillbilly).