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Ant-eating Spider.
Morphology. The adult spiders 2–3 mm long; of medium build, or decidedly plump-bodied; with legs of medium length; with eight eyes. The eyes comprising a pair of large, circular anterior medians and three smaller laterals in a curved-longitudinal row on either side. Metatarsus IV of the females without a calamistrum. Tarsal claws 3. Tarsus IV without a ventral ‘comb’. The abdomen plain dorsally (dark brown above, but contrastingly pale yellow below). The abdomen of the females without a cribellum.
The adults not making snare-webs; actively pursuing their prey (found among black ants, Lasius niger, on which they exclusively feed).
Representation in Britain and Ireland. 1 species in Britain; in the genus Zodarion (Z. italicum). Confined to southern England.
Comments. Exhibiting only one pair of clearly visible spinnerets, the others being very reduced.
We advise against extracting comparative information from the descriptions. This is much more easily achieved using the DELTA data files or the interactive key, which allows access to the character list, illustrations, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting or lacking specified attributes, and distributions of character states within any set of taxa. See also Guidelines for using data taken from Web publications.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 2003 onwards. The spider families of Britain and Ireland. Version: 5th August 2019. delta-intkey.com’.