Artfully lost floss

Did you know that spiders sew with a few different kinds of silk ?? Some strands are strong for longer spans, and there are strains simply meant to be sticky. There's springier silk, too, good for impacts with insects, which stretches, just to mention a few. And, to describe the many trapping methods that the master-weavers have adapted would take more than can be properly captured in a modest string of words.

For, in a fashion of fishing, replacing bait with alluring, angled lines of light, is a hunter casting tinsel tendrils, silvery and slight, tightly wound tens of times round a target in the centre, with two points as a prize for this bullseye for all who dare to enter.

Spiders produce special, protective proteins to strengthen webs against bacteria. Or to safe-guard them from offensive mold, clearly opting for a nice, spot-free area.

So, the average arachnid's eating place appears deceptively clean. Like a broken glass plate made only of its fractures, which holds more if less is seen.

The invisible addition of another tailored protein, slows undue evaporation, extending the lifespan of vulnerable spiderwebs, while depleted ones fall victim to degradation.

Arch-villains and killers, architects and artisans, arachnids are unlikely characters. Creatures of contrast, they create to destroy, deploying beautiful traps in ugly application. With acrobatic alacrity, arachnids construct spectacular-looking traps, easily catching unlucky insects in tacky, glistening nets.

But, might more senior spiders, losing their juice, need to reuse some web, when draws the end of their days, to find life's fluids, have less flow than ebb ?? No longer able to entice flies, by ties, wetted with sweet scent, so, wont to wonder, prone to ponder, where their lost suppleness went ??

Once, when spiders invention was an elaborately clever extension of its already, excellent senses, this original installation, designed to heighten vibration felt through every tiny fibre, was a dangerous hazard and visual sensation all at once. In such a natural patch of non-descript space, unmatched complexity existed. Amazing artistry, slightly eclipsed by its captivating atrocity.

Now, found partly in half-seen places, remain impossibly long and slender traces of formerly impressive structures. Fine, artfully lost floss stretched across expanses betwixt branches, or attached to a cactus stuck next to a rock. Glassy tendrils, unintendedly tangled amidst prickly spinifex grass are apparently affixed with only approximate care, for a more attractive, natural aspect.

Spider web exceeds the strength of steel by several times, with only a skerrick of the substance. Verily, that barely formed facade, belies the truth of its constitution and the secret design of its maker. Fierce beyond defining, and so deftly hiding its deathly intent.

In truth, its teeth await with venom for victims who lift the evil veil, draped on purpose by a despicable poisoner, poised beneath the leafy periphery. Certain curtains oughtn't be adjusted, short of utmost caution.

The sheerest of veils masks the face of a monster that sleeps beneath this threadbare front. Each scarcely-there stitch seems etched in the air, yet this slightest of disguises hides the monster most finely.

Miss Muffit, snuffed it !! A captor trapped her. Too little to be bitten. What a rotten way to go !! Have the clever weavers, ever set free, a gnat that they believed was too tiny? Maybe, itsy bitsy bugs, not big enough for biting, are released from their sticky demise? The mouth of death might smile, acidly, as it wishes a welcome return.

A web's condition is a comment upon the kind of creeper who keeps it. If it's dotted by flotsam, flecked with leaves and debris, expect the expert spider to inspect his contraption. Here, present success is proudly expressed next to excess litter for later extraction.

When wind whistles through a web, nearby bugs hear, to be drawn toward danger by sweet siren song. Suckered into mother nature's diabolical orchestrations, gullibly tempted by nice-sounding lines. Their notable inclusion adds to the sound, affecting the tone existing around those finely tuned, stringed instruments of death, plucked by luckless insects. Twice stuck and suspended, duly destined to spend the rest of their days like hollow notes on an empty page, stapled in place !!

Arachnids are crafty killers and committed chroniclers of each case, confessing their crimes with expressive clarity, and a compulsion to punctuate !!

Delicately collected specimens of spider webs, suspended on splendid silk pages, can be displayed in a way that makes spiders look like writers, working at types of catch-phrases.

Wayne Henderson