First ever species of spider?

Placeboani2

Arachnoknight
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I've just started my university course in Animal conservation science. I have an assignment on the geological timescale. This made me wonder, What was the first ever spider to have appeared on earth.
Apparently spiders and snakes first appeared in the Cretaceous period in the mesozoic era if thats of any help. I've tried looking myself but i have a heavy work load at the minute so haven't much time to research into it. I think its a pretty interesting subject in spider enthusiasts interested in their history :)
 

khil

Arachnobaron
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Spiders appeared way before the cretaceous, LOL
 

Placeboani2

Arachnoknight
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Spiders appeared way before the cretaceous, LOL
According to all my tutors and many text books i've read they haven't. Maybe the common ancestor were around but nothing classed as 'The spider'...
 

LV-426

Arachnobaron
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I've just started my university course in Animal conservation science. I have an assignment on the geological timescale. This made me wonder, What was the first ever spider to have appeared on earth.
Apparently spiders and snakes first appeared in the Cretaceous period in the mesozoic era if thats of any help. I've tried looking myself but i have a heavy work load at the minute so haven't much time to research into it. I think its a pretty interesting subject in spider enthusiasts interested in their history :)
i am interested in what T alive today is closest in terms of evolution, genetics to prehistoric Ts
 

JimM

Arachnoangel
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According to all my tutors and many text books i've read they haven't.
If that's what you're being told, and that's what you're reading, I can only suggest you change all the above variables.

The Cretaceous was last week in geologic terms.
Try the Carboniferous....
 

Placeboani2

Arachnoknight
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Its only what ive read. Apparantly ancestors of the spider evolved long before but the true spider was around then but i dont know for sure your probably all right haha.
 

Stan Schultz

Arachnoprince
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found alot of articles on this matter,maybe this will help you a bit
http://www.theallineed.com/paleontology/06071111.htm
But, take care to note this portion of the first sentence:

"... oldest example of a spider to have spun the vertical orb-shaped spider web ..."

There are a whole bunch of "cover your ***" modifiers in there. The mygalomorphs, and especially the liphistiomorphs are a lot older.
 

Stan Schultz

Arachnoprince
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i am interested in what T alive today is closest in terms of evolution, genetics to prehistoric Ts
The liphistiomorphs (called either Liphistiomorphae or Mesothelae), very rare spiders now found only in southeastern Asia, are generally considered to be the oldest living group of spiders, principally because of the segmentation of their opisthsomas, but also because of a bunch of other primitive characters. They apparently date from about 375 to 400 million years ago.

Because really old spider fossils are so rare and generally not in the best shape, and because we're only reasonably sure of the coarser aspects of spider taxonomy and evolution, a lot of this information is likely to be quite "iffy." Any or all of it could change tomorrow.
 

bobusboy

Arachnoknight
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Hm thats something to look into, Although wikipedia is hardly the best source of information, Its frowned upon to use as a reference.

Use the references from the bottom of the wiki pages. They often link to credible and useful sites.
 
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