Whip spider
Ariamnes colubrinus
The whip spider is a long, thin spider that looks just like a little twig. It hangs on a thread about a metre above the ground, as if a twig had got caught in a web. It is a clever hunter of other spiders.
Fun fact: spiders are not insects. Insects have six legs, spiders have eight. Everyone calls them bugs anyway!
Lives in
Eastern Australia: Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland
Length
1.3 to 2.2 cm (0.51 to 0.87 in)
males 13 mm, females 22 mmWhat does it eat?
It mostly eats young wandering spiders, and some insects too.
How big is it?
How long is it?
🍚as long as 4 grains of rice in a row🍽️could run across a dinner table in 2 seconds⚡moves 23 times its own body length every second
How big is Whip spider compared to YOU?
Just maths in your browser. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.
How fast is it?
A tortoise about 0.3 km/h (0.19 mph)
Whip spider about 1.8 km/h (1.1 mph)
A person walking about 5 km/h (3.1 mph)
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
It can be cream, brown or greenish.
2
It waits on one or two threads, and when prey touches the silk, it comes down to grab it.
3
It wraps its meal up in silk.
4
Its tiny egg sac hangs from a single strong thread and holds 40 to 50 yellow-green eggs.
you asked
Most asked questions about Whip spider
?Why is it called a whip spider?
Because its body is so long and thin, like a whip or a twig.
?What does the whip spider eat?
Mostly young wandering spiders, and some insects.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Ariamnes colubrinus
- Group
- Spiders
- Family
- Theridiidae
- Classification
- Arachnida > Araneae > Theridiidae
- Lives on
- Australia and Oceania
Where the facts come from
- Ariamnes colubrinus (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Poyt448 Peter Woodard. Public domain, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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