Hieber Craig S
Department of Biology, St. Anselm College, NH 03102, Manchester, USA.
Oecologia. 1992 Mar;89(3):442-448. doi: 10.1007/BF00317424.
The abilities of the cocoons of the spiders Mecynogea lemniscata and Argiope aurantia to protect the enclosed egg and spiderling stages from desiccation were investigated in the laboratory under controlled humidities, and in the field under ambient conditions. For M. lemniscata, which has a relatively small clutch (8-30 eggs) and remains in the cocoon for approximately 9-10 months, removal of the cocoon had no effect on water loss from the egg stage, nor did it adversely affect hatching or molting success. Cocoon removal did, however, significantly affect water loss and, consequently, survival in the spiderling stage at all humidities in the laboratory and in the field. The importance of the cocoon for survival is probably related to the unusually long time M. lemniscata spiderlings spend in the cocoon overwintering. For A. aurantia, which has a substantially larger clutch size (300-1400 eggs) and remains in the cocoon for a shorter 6-7 months, cocoon removal had no effect on water loss, egg hatching success, molting success, nor spiderling survival. The lack of an effect suggests that other factors (e.g., relative humidity at the oviposition site, or a large clutch size) may be more important in controlling water loss for A. aurantia.
在实验室可控湿度条件下以及野外自然环境中，研究了长疣蛛（Mecynogea lemniscata）和金蛛（Argiope aurantia）的茧对其所包裹的卵和幼蛛阶段抵御干燥的能力。对于长疣蛛，其卵块相对较小（8 - 30枚卵），且在茧中停留约9 - 10个月，去除茧对卵阶段的水分流失没有影响，也不会对孵化或蜕皮成功率产生不利影响。然而，去除茧确实会显著影响水分流失，进而影响实验室和野外所有湿度条件下幼蛛阶段的存活率。茧对存活的重要性可能与长疣蛛幼蛛在茧中越冬的异常长时间有关。对于金蛛，其卵块要大得多（300 - 1400枚卵），且在茧中停留时间较短，为6 - 7个月，去除茧对水分流失、卵孵化成功率、蜕皮成功率以及幼蛛存活率均无影响。这种无影响表明，其他因素（如产卵地点的相对湿度或大的卵块大小）可能在控制金蛛的水分流失方面更为重要。
