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Sticker of Swifts' ant-hunter spider
Bug card No. 4262 of 4,939

Swifts' ant-hunter spider

Zenodorus swiftorum
Name means: “named after Kristin and John Swift, who helped protect nature in New Guinea”
Eats: Other bugs and small animalsSpidersRainforests and jungles8 legsNot an insect, but a bug cousin

Swifts' ant-hunter spider is a small jumping spider from tropical Australia and New Guinea. As its name says, it hunts ants. It is common, but its looks change a lot from one spider to the next.

Fun fact: spiders are not insects. Insects have six legs, spiders have eight. Everyone calls them bugs anyway!
Lives in
Papua New Guinea and northern Australia
Top speed
about 0.8 km/h (0.5 mph)
On foot, estimate
What does it eat?
It is a hunter that catches ants by sneaking up and pouncing on them.
For real!Photo of Swifts' ant-hunter spider
Picture by G. Winterflood. CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

How fast is it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

1

It belongs to a group of jumping spiders that hunt ants.

2

It is common in tropical Australia, but different spiders can look quite different.

3

The females are a little bigger than the males.

you asked

Most asked questions about Swifts' ant-hunter spider

?What does Swifts' ant-hunter spider eat?

It hunts ants.

For bug experts

Scientific name
Zenodorus swiftorum
Group
Spiders
Family
Salticidae
Classification
Arachnida > Araneae > Salticidae
Lives on
Australia and Oceania
Also known as
Swifts' ant-hunter

Where the facts come from

  1. Zenodorus swiftorum (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
  2. Picture by G. Winterflood. CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.

If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.

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More from the same group: Spiders

Also at home here: Rainforests and jungles

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