Bat-eating spiders: the most bizarre thing you'll see today

We have good news and bad news. The good thing is that scientists from European universities have uncovered more details about the relationship between spiders and bats. The bad news is that, in the end, bats end up bad ... That's because there are some species of spiders that feed on flying mammals.

That's what you read! There are species of spiders - which usually produce webs - large enough to catch and devour bats. This is not exactly new to science, but the study published in March in Plos One showed that species that behave this way are more frequent than previously assumed.

To reach this conclusion, the authors talked to other scientists, extensively reviewed available scientific literature, searched the Internet, and searched for images of spider devouring bats on Flickr. At the end of this survey, the experts found 52 cases to study.

In the wild

Researchers have revealed that these spiders are found on every continent except Antarctica. Most bats are caught from huge webs such as Nephilidae and Eriophora spiders. As adults, the legs of these arachnids can reach an opening of 10 to 15 centimeters and their webs can be more than one meter in diameter.

Bats have also been found trapped in Parawixia and Argiope spider webs, which are small-sized spiders that also produce smaller webs. A minority of species, such as tarantulas and other hunting spiders, have been seen capturing their prey without the help of webs.

And if just imagining a huge spider devouring a bat you're already impressed, it's time to check out several records of these amazing scenes:

# 1 - Madre de Dios, Peru

# 2 - Rio Dulce, Guatemala

# 3 - Queensland, Australia

# 4 - Nisela Lodge, Swaziland

# 5 - Aberdeen Country Park, Hong Kong

# 6 - Yarapa River, Peru

# 7 - La Selva Biological Station, Costa Rica