Comments on: It’s Raining Spiders in Brazil

By: Jerry Gochenour

Jerry Gochenour — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 20:31:39 +0000

This phenomena also occurs in northern Florida (Saint Augustine) where banana spiders build huge webs between telephone and power lines and it is normal to see 50-100 of them in their webs during the day. So, I guess Florida has a few social spiders as well. Strangely enough, in the past 14 years, I have observed that this happens most often and in greater numbers when our area experiences hurricanes and severe tropical storms. May be a coincidence, but perhaps not.

By: Val

Val — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 20:27:41 +0000

Is there another copy of the video? I went to watch it and it said that it had been removed by the owner.

By: Mike

Mike — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 19:08:02 +0000

Interesting! I hope that everyone’s Sunday is going great and safe,plus I hope that they had a nice Presidents’Day and enjoyed all of the other holidays that we’ve recently had.

By: bob

bob — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 18:07:01 +0000

video link down….repost?

By: stonercat

stonercat — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 23:10:53 +0000

a strong wind impossiable thats cant be if indeed that you said the big gust of wind blown away the spiders then i completly think your balderdash i say

By: Leticia Aviles

Leticia Aviles — Wed, 20 Feb 2013 18:18:58 +0000

Interesting news story, except that the spiders shown in the video are probably not Anelosimus eximius, which is a spider that builds irregular communal webs and whose distribution does not extend that far south in Brazil. The species in the video is more likely Parawixia bistriata, which is a colonial spider that forms complexes consisting of grouped individual orb-webs and does occur in areas of Southern Brazil and Northern Argentina. Here is a Wired news report on the phenomenon, with comments from several arachnologists who have worked on social spiders:
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/02/thousands-of-spiders/