News October 10 11:59 am

Amber proves that ancient spiders were just as terrifying

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It takes a just the right kind of person to not transform into a little girl when a giant spider comes near you. The eight legged terrors have been scaring people for as long as there have been people… or even before. Paleontologists have been doing their thing and it was only a matter of time until they made some sort of ancient spider discovery.

Like the plot of Jurassic Park, millions of years old amber trapped a spider right before it was about to kill a wasp. Good thing they can’t use its DNA to make modern ancient spiders. Not a big deal? Well, this spider and wasp are from the Early Cretaceous period 97-110 million years ago. THAT IS A LONG TIME AGO. This just goes to show that Early Cretaceous spiders were just as frightening as they are now. Evil never changes.

It actually gets worse. This fossil also contains the body of a male spider in the same web, this hints at spider social behavior. Why… is this a thing? Apparently some modern spiders are still social but most are solitary. Social spiders work together, hunt together, feed together, and freak me out together.

The good news is that this specific spider is way dead, the bad news is... what’s that saying? There is always a spider within three feet of you? F@#$ that noise.

[i09]

Historian, teacher, writer, gamer, cheat master, and tech guru: follow on Twitter @AndrewC_GZ

Tags: Amber, spiders, Early Cretaceous, Jurassic Park, evil