Thomisus spectabilis
Thomisus spectabilis, also known as the white crab spider or Australian crab spider, is a small spider found in Australia and far east Asia.
The body length of the female is up to 10 mm, the male 6.2 mm. Including legs, the spider is around 3 cm across. This spider is usually white, though sometimes may appear yellow. The legs and head appear almost translucent. Thomisus spectabilis is an ambush predator, often seen resting in flowers of its same color. Its egg sacs are laid in a folded leaf, and the cream colored eggs, typically 1 mm in diameter, range between 200 and 370 in number.
These spiders primarily eat insects and their preference for symmetry helps them in capturing pollinating insects such as butterflies and bees. The spider also takes advantage of its color scheme's reflectance of UV light to create a color contrast in the visual field of the bees that attracts the bees.
The Australian crab spider is mostly a suburban or urban animal found in Eastern Australia, and their habitat is among white and yellow daisies.
Thomisus spectabilis are a venomous species. Their venom is not known to be medically significant. These spiders do not weave webs, but rather chase and ambush their prey.
Description
T. spectabilis undergo a unique color transformation from yellow to white. The color change helps them not only hide from predators, but stalk prey in similarly colored daisies as well. This transformation allows them to switch between appearing conspicuous and cryptic to their prey. The colorful bodies allow spiders to reflect UV-light in a manner that attracts bees to their flower. When the spider changes to a specific color, the color is displayed uniformly across its head, legs, and abdomen. The legs of this spider span up to 30 mm. They have small black eyes that are organized into a white band across the head resembling a mask. The abdomen of the spider has a pentagon shape and two small bumps across it. They have stout legs arranged similarly to a crab. The spider has pinching fangs, but no claw tufts, so it is not able to climb across smooth surfaces.Phylogeny
Closely related species
Australian crab spiders are very similar to other crab spiders across the world, such as the European, Alaskan, or Canadian crab spider. One similarity between these spiders is that rather than building webs, they hide from their prey and ambush them with their forelimbs.Crab spiders are in the family Thomisidae. This family has four lineages/clades: Borboropactus clade, Epidius clade, Stephanopis clade and the Thomisus clade. The Australian crab spider belongs to the Thomisus clade. There is very minimal genetic divergence in this clade. The ability of Thomisus spectabilis to change color is shared by Misumena, Diaea, and Runcinia spiders which are also members of the Thomisidae family and have high genetic relatedness with the Australian Crab spider. Misumena vatia is a close relative of T. spectabilis but instead has a holarctic distribution. Thomisids fall within the larger Dionycha clade, and this clade is defined by the loss of an unpaired tarsal claw for the animal. Genetic sequencing of Thomisids found that the 16S gene was 430 nucleotide base pairs long, H3 gene was 328 base pairs, and COI gene was 557 base pairs. All of these basepair numbers are unique to the Thomisids within the Dionycha clade.
There are three distinct features that define a spider from the Thomisidae family: leg 3 and leg 4 are shorter and weaker than leg 1 and leg 2, lateral eyes that are larger than median eyes, and presence of a group of setae. The Thomisus clade of the Australian crab spider has the following morphological similarities: circular scopula hairs, subequal bulbus, disc shaped tegulum, a sperm duct with a spherical, peripheral course, no conductor, and no median apophysis.
Habitat and distribution
Habitat
Australian crab spiders choose habitats that increase their chances of catching prey. Since this involves creating contrast between itself and the flower, it will pick flower colors and flower positions that maximize the contrast. Due to the importance of contrast with flowers, these spiders cannot simply choose habitats with large numbers of its prey. Instead, they must think about both flower type and prey number while choosing habitats in a way that maximizes capture. T. spectabilis is mostly attracted to staying in flowers that are newer, and is drawn to them through olfactory cues. It is most commonly found in tropical or subtropical areas, but some also prefer white clothing lines.Geographic distribution
They are spread throughout Australia, but are primarily located in Eastern Australia. It is mainly a suburban spider. In Brisbane, they are normally found in backyards, bushes, and gardens.Diet
These spiders are a predatory species, and they feed mainly on insects. They mainly eat live or recently killed insects. Some examples of these insects are crickets, drosophila flies, and pollinators such as honey bees and butterflies. The spiders are an important form of pest control as they protect the flowers they inhabit from attack by insects. The energy obtained from consuming these insects allows the adult female Australian crab spider to produce a clutch of eggs.Webs
Australian crab spiders do not build webs, as they capture their prey through ambush and hiding rather than web capture. They will use fallen leaves or live foliage to hide their bodies, which are easy to camouflage due to its color in order to ambush their prey. They can wait up to periods of 2 hours hidden under foliage in order to strike their prey. However, they do still have the ability to make silk, and typically use it to build retreats. During the day, they rest in these retreats that are composed of silk and leaves. At night, they come out of their retreats to wait on flowers and ambush their prey.Behavior
Prey capture
Cues
This is a spider that does not capture prey through webs, but instead sits on flowers and ambushes pollinators as they arrive to the flower. They use cues from their prey and from the flowers to pick their habitat. Although many spiders use camouflage to hide from spiders before eventually attacking them, the Australian crab spider is actually not cryptic to its prey as it hides. In fact, honeybees can visually determine the difference between the spiders and the flowers in which they are waiting. The mechanism of deceit for Australian crab spiders involves influencing and exploiting signal communication between pollinators and plants. Insects choose plants that have larger flowers, available nectar, a specific odor, a certain color, or a certain symmetrical pattern on the flower. Honeybees specifically are more attracted to flowers with certain odors, colors, and symmetrical patterns. The Australian crab spider uses the same combination of visual and olfactory cues to attract bees towards the flower they are sitting on.Symmetry affinity
The honeybee's affinity for symmetry leads it to pollinate flowers with symmetrical patterns. Bees and Australian crab spiders are both drawn to symmetry, and this leads both the predator and prey to come together at the same flowers. Coevolution of bees with the Australian crab spider has resulted in the spiders being attracted to the same cues as the bees. It has also resulted in the bees developing anti-predatory behaviour. Despite the heightened risk of going to the same flowers as the Australian crab spiders, they continue to do it because those flowers present the highest potential reward in nectar and freshness for the bees. Honeybees show a strong preference for radial symmetry over bilateral symmetry while crab spiders do not discriminate. The white crab spider's preference for symmetry, along with olfactory cues, draws it to hide among flowers and ambush honeybees as they arrive. The olfactory cues tell the honeybees which flowers hold the biggest rewards for them, and these spiders have evolved to be attracted to that same scent because the bees are the spiders' reward.UV reflectance
The spiders are able to actively influence honeybees to come to the flower that they are positioned on. When the Australian crab spider is in its white body state, it is able to reflect UV light. This reflected UV light causes activation in the UV photoreceptors of the bees, and increases the UV receptor contrast and the contrast between the spiders and the flowers. The bees are attracted to this contrast, and subsequently go to the flowers at which they are ambushed by the spiders.There is temporal and individual variation in UV reflectance between Australian Crab spiders. This variation is most frequently in the range of 300 nm to 400 nm. Temporal variation can be seen in differences in UV-reflectance between different years. In 2008, Thomisus spectabilis were more UV-reflective and created larger color contrasts with flowers than in 2009. This temporal variation is correlated with the spiders adopting strategies switching between low and high conspicuousness. This is necessitated by a combination of Thomisus spectabilis' prey and predator behaviour and the balance of attracting prey while maintaining safety from predators. The most common predators of the spider are wasps and birds, and both of these animals are able to perceive UV-light. Thus, the Australian Crab Spider is much more likely to be harmed in a white UV-bright reflective patterns than a white UV-dull reflective pattern.
Individual UV-reflectance variation is not necessarily due to the amount of prey they have already consumed, as their adjustment is based on prey availability and environment rather than satiation. It is also not due to the body size or shape of the spiders. Rather, it has the strongest relationship with predator presence. In the absence of predators, UV-Reflectance will always increase because it always makes them more likely to attract prey. This is in stark contrast to other spider species, such as Misumena vatia, that almost always vary their UV-reflectance to match their backgrounds and lower conspicuousness.