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Asked by taylorp to Andrew, Beth, Bruce, Lindy, Lizzie on 17 Jun 2012. This question was also asked by maia12344, alexd2003, harli12344.
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Beth Mortimer answered on 17 Jun 2012:
When I decided to do this work, I hadn’t actually worked with spiders before. It isn’t uncommon to apply for a project that already has money, even if you don’t know anything about it before you start.
Now that I’ve done two years, I really enjoy working with spiders and really respect them for what they manage to do. The most interesting thing about spiders is definitely their use of silk; they make their own set of materials that have the properties that they need to feed, survive and make babies. Unlike bigger animals with a backbone (vertebrates – like fish, birds, mammals) they manage really complex behaviours without a really complicated nervous system. For example, they choose to use the right type of silk out of 8 in exactly the right way in their web to catch prey effectively. They are relatively simple animals that achieve so much! There are over 40 000 species of spider and they have been around for over 300 million years – which is a long time to become successful!
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Comments
yoda7 commented on :
Good question, I would really like to have a job like yours. Studying animals all day would be a dream job (as long as it isn’t spides!!!!!!)