Weird but true.

The rumble gets louder and louder, starting to make the hairs on the spider’s back stand up, pressure building in its ears like a concrete saw bearing down. It can’t take it anymore.

The spider mother emerges from her bark into the daylight, agitated beyond sense, lashing out at any movement, completely irrational in her actions and unable to stop herself from moving towards the vibration.

It is coming from a 4WD.

….In the case of arachnids like spiders, vibrations seem to arouse their senses and make them agitated enough to put aside their normal self-preservation instincts to run towards danger.

“I deliberately got an old diesel in order to get this effect. Because the new ones are too sweet and smooth,” says Dr Raven, who studies arachnids in Australia.

“When you let one of these old diesels idle for example on sand on a hot day, spiders that normally will not move in the daylight, are running towards the car. They are highly disturbed.

“I think what they’re doing is they’re running towards the zero point between the four wheels.”

The zero point would act like the eye of the vibration storm — a place of calm in among the nauseating vibrations.

“We get higher species numbers by that method alone, than we do by any other single method of collecting by eye, by trap, by spraying anything,” Dr Raven says.

“This is the best way, because you get things coming out from holes in the ground, you get them coming out from under bark in the tree, coming down the tree.

“It is like Brisbane’s Queen Street Mall — these things were just thundering past — these giant spiders walking across the ground towards the car. It was just an amazing sort of an event.”

Full report

Spiders are very sensitive to vibrations

This helps them when insects get caught in their webs

To us, it might be like turning the sound up really loud.

Fascinating article.

DA, you probably do not want to click on the embedded link.

Tau.Neutrino said:

Spiders are very sensitive to vibrations

This helps them when insects get caught in their webs

To us, it might be like turning the sound up really loud.

Spider rave perhaps

Tau.Neutrino said:

Spiders are very sensitive to vibrations

This helps them when insects get caught in their webs

To us, it might be like turning the sound up really loud.

Sensory overload caused by humans is a big problem for many living things, submarine sonar, ships noises, airplanes noise, vehicle vibrations, high powered lights, etc

Tau.Neutrino said:

Tau.Neutrino said:

Spiders are very sensitive to vibrations

This helps them when insects get caught in their webs

To us, it might be like turning the sound up really loud.

Sensory overload caused by humans is a big problem for many living things, submarine sonar, ships noises, airplanes noise, vehicle vibrations, high powered lights, etc

It’s annoying to many humans as well, silence is rare

from the article

“When you let one of these old diesels idle for example on sand on a hot day, spiders that normally will not move in the daylight, are running towards the car. They are highly disturbed.

“I think what they’re doing is they’re running towards the zero point between the four wheels.”

The zero point would act like the eye of the vibration storm — a place of calm in among the nauseating vibrations.

Cymek said:

Tau.Neutrino said:

Tau.Neutrino said:

Spiders are very sensitive to vibrations

This helps them when insects get caught in their webs

To us, it might be like turning the sound up really loud.

Sensory overload caused by humans is a big problem for many living things, submarine sonar, ships noises, airplanes noise, vehicle vibrations, high powered lights, etc

It’s annoying to many humans as well, silence is rare

It helps sometimes, to be hearing impaired. I’m lucky though because it is usually me who makes the loudest noises within my earshot.

Tau.Neutrino said:

from the article

“When you let one of these old diesels idle for example on sand on a hot day, spiders that normally will not move in the daylight, are running towards the car. They are highly disturbed.

“I think what they’re doing is they’re running towards the zero point between the four wheels.”

The zero point would act like the eye of the vibration storm — a place of calm in among the nauseating vibrations.

More likely with a diesel that is not common rail.

Why do the spiders tend to move towards the zero point, instead of running away from the source?

I mean yes there is less vibration at the zero point, but as you get further away, there is also less vibration, they cant sense this?

Tau.Neutrino said:

Why do the spiders tend to move towards the zero point, instead of running away from the source?

I mean yes there is less vibration at the zero point, but as you get further away, there is also less vibration, they cant sense this?

Can they map the zero point from far away somehow?

I have noticed that situation over the years, I remember one occasion in the mallee of SA when I had the engine running that this huge burrowing spider came lumbering over from behind a tree and heading straight for my 4WD, it eventually settled on a discarded orange skin, which may have had less vibrations going through it. But, beetles, cockroaches and many other insects are attracted to a running vehicle.

> I deliberately got an old diesel in order to get this effect. Because the new ones are too sweet and smooth. When you let one of these old diesels idle for example on sand on a hot day, spiders that normally will not move in the daylight, are running towards the car.

For a spider, vibrations mean food. I think the spiders want to eat the 4WD.

sibeen said:

Fascinating article.

DA, you probably do not want to click on the embedded link.

Thanks. Kinda figured that out for myself. Thank you forumers for not posting pics 😊

Divine Angel said:

sibeen said:

Fascinating article.

DA, you probably do not want to click on the embedded link.

Thanks. Kinda figured that out for myself. Thank you forumers for not posting pics 😊

No worries.