Although scientists have known there were a few types of fish-eating spiders out there, we recently just discovered there are many more than we once thought. There are 26 known spider species that eat fish from eight families, and some have been observed doing this behavior in the wild. The spiders do this by dangling their front legs in water while they sit on a leaf at the surface, paralyzing a fish that comes by with neurotoxins, and dragging the fish away onto land to consume it. Surprisingly (at least to me), half of the wild observations were in the U.S. and not in the tropics! There are a ton of spiders of the Dolomedes genus in Florida, where they feast on mosquitofish. They are also found in the U.K., Australia, and South America - in fact, on every continent except Antarctica.
These fish-eating spiders are only able to eat small fish - the largest fish one was spotted eating was 9 inches long (still huge for a spider). They probably still get most of their food from insects, but fish are a nice, big, protein-rich meal that they can enjoy occasionally.
www.newscientist.com/article/dn25750-pescatarian-spiders-munch-on-fish-all-over-the-world.html
These fish-eating spiders are only able to eat small fish - the largest fish one was spotted eating was 9 inches long (still huge for a spider). They probably still get most of their food from insects, but fish are a nice, big, protein-rich meal that they can enjoy occasionally.
www.newscientist.com/article/dn25750-pescatarian-spiders-munch-on-fish-all-over-the-world.html
You crazy, fish-eating spider. Photo credit: Patrick Randall.