Red Hairs?

[si_sleaf]

So what are those red hairs for around the mouths of nearly all my T's? And why are they red? I've tried to find out myself but couldn't come up with anything. Is there a reason?

Here's my P. cambridgei (with all of it's legs ):

 

[Code Monkey]

Why they are red I couldn't tell you, but they are part of the feeding mechanism for the T. The hairs all point towards the relatively small oral orifice the Ts has for sucking up liquids. The hairs serve to both guide the liquids home and to filter out solid particles too big to be sucked up. As you get to the actual orifice, there is a net of hairs so fine it can filter out the particles in India ink.

 

[deifiler]

Red is to aid in the threat posture... Almost every animal understands certain colours... Spiders arn't the only animals that use the red in this way. For instance when a dog snarls to reveal red gums, or like them weird chicken birds that inflate the red pouch to scare males. As do certain amphibians, the list is endless, and don't forget all the other colours.

Colours are exploited all the time int he animal kingdom; from insects like wasps markings, to reptiles like the markings of a king snake... Even beetles that won't taste good to birds etc

 

[RugbyDave]

i would have to agree. a chromatic barrier.

when those legs are up, and the fangs are out, and theres an ominous patch of red right there, you know what the deal is

peace
dave

 

[si_sleaf]

Aah, I see. Ifeel like a more wise arachnosquire now. Thanks guys

 

[Code Monkey]

Originally posted by RugbyDave
i would have to agree. a chromatic barrier.

when those legs are up, and the fangs are out, and theres an ominous patch of red right there, you know what the deal is

peace
dave

Yes, makes sense, but has this been verified?

The red is universal with Ts, present even in many species that rarely if ever engage in threat postures. So, unless someone has actually done the behavioral studies to see if it is indeed a threat flag, intuition may very well be wrong here.

It could be true that they're red purely by virtue of their structure and the color serves no purpose except to make people go, "oooh".

 

[deifiler]

Originally posted by Code Monkey
Yes, makes sense, but has this been verified?

The red is universal with Ts, present even in many species that rarely if ever engage in threat postures. So, unless someone has actually done the behavioral studies to see if it is indeed a threat flag, intuition may very well be wrong here.

It could be true that they're red purely by virtue of their structure and the color serves no purpose except to make people go, "oooh".

I'm not being cocky, but just how would this theory be verified?

I wasn't saying it was true, just the general opinion of how colours are used in the animal kingdom.

Perhaps evolution has gifted animals with little things like this just to make life that little bit easier

 

[RugbyDave]

and this brings us back to the whole "there's alot we don't know about these animals" deal

we just don't really know.

again, if you ask me (and you were dolling it out ), its a chromatic barrier of sorts.

but its interesting to see everyones different ideas, though.

peace
dave

 

[luther]

It's obviously an attempt at natural lipstick.