Distribution
Mexico to PanamaReferences:
Some text fragments are auto parsed from Wikipedia.
http://www.wsc.nmbe.ch/species/4701/Micrathena_brevipesMicrathena brevipes
Micrathena brevipes
The spider genus Micrathena contains more than a hundred species, most of them Neotropical woodland orb-weavers.
With the naked eye they stand out due to the arrow-shaped body being colored bright yellow contrasting with a black background. This combination is highly visible. As you might expect the spider may not be attracting attention to itself inviting predators to prey upon it. This is warning coloration also known as aposomatic coloration. Any bird naive enough to ignore those colors and try to eat what would otherwise appear to be a tasty morsel, will come to grief as the spines on the spiders body lodge it in the bird’s bill. Despite its best efforts the extract it, the bird initially cannot. As it remains stuck the spider is issuing from its body a noxious, foul tasting secretion. The bird when it finally does rid itself of the vilest tasting food it has tried will then forever associate black and yellow with the woeful experience and will never consume anything sporting those colors again.
With the naked eye they stand out due to the arrow-shaped body being colored bright yellow contrasting with a black background. This combination is highly visible. As you might expect the spider may not be attracting attention to itself inviting predators to prey upon it. This is warning coloration also known as aposomatic coloration. Any bird naive enough to ignore those colors and try to eat what would otherwise appear to be a tasty morsel, will come to grief as the spines on the spiders body lodge it in the bird’s bill. Despite its best efforts the extract it, the bird initially cannot. As it remains stuck the spider is issuing from its body a noxious, foul tasting secretion. The bird when it finally does rid itself of the vilest tasting food it has tried will then forever associate black and yellow with the woeful experience and will never consume anything sporting those colors again.
