Short Essay on Spiders

Spiders:

1. Spiders are arachnids.  They are not insects.
2. Arachnids are any of a group of small animals, similar to insects but with four pairs of legs, that includes spiders, scorpions, ticks, and mites.
3. Spiders have eight legs.  Most spiders have eight eyes.  They do not have wings or antennae.
4. All spiders make silk.  Some spiders use their silk to spin webs in the shape of a wheel. 

Kinds of spiders:

• There are many kinds of spiders. 
• There are at least 30,000 different kinds of spiders. 
• Scientists think there are many more that we have not yet discovered. 

The life span of spiders:

• Most spiders live from six months to two years. 
• Some big spiders can live as long as twenty years.

Spider home:  Where spider lives?

• They can live on high mountain tops or in deep caves. 
• Some spiders live in wet areas.
• Some live in dry deserts.
• Spiders also live in houses, basements, sheds, and gardens.
• They live wherever there are insects for them to catch and eat.

The life cycle of spiders:

Some spiders lay as many as 3000eggs.

1.  Spider and its Egg Sac:

• A female spider lays hundreds of eggs. 
• The spider wraps the eggs in threads of silk to make an egg sac. 
• Then she hangs the egg sac in her web.

2.  Hatching:

• The eggs hatch inside the egg sac. 
• All the baby spiders, called spiderlings, stay inside the sac until the weather is warm.
• The spiderlings continue to grow in their egg sacs. 
• They bite a tiny hole in the egg sac and come out when they are ready.

3.  Spiderling:

• The new spiderling is tiny and white. 
• She stays with the other spiderlings in a wriggling cluster. 
• Only a few spiderlings will survive but many spiderlings will not. 
• They will be eaten by other hungry spiderlings.

4.  Ballooning

• The spiderling leaves the other in few days.  She goes ballooning to find a new home.  She climbs to the top of something tall, to catch a breeze. 
• The spiderlings let out silk from their spinnerets.  The breeze tugs at the silk. 
• The wind lifts and carries all the spiderlings.  They make their home wherever they land.

5.  Moulting

• Her skin gets tight as the spiderling grows.  It is too small for her now.  She must get rid of her old skin.  She hangs upside down from a silk thread. 
• Her old, dry skin splits along the sides of her body.  Then she pulls her legs out of the skin.  Getting rid of her old skin like this is called moulting.

For more Essays on Animals, please click the link below.

• Few Lines on an Elephant
• Few Lines on an Owl
• Few Lines on the Cheetah
• Few Lines on the Bear