How many legs does a spider and a tick have: what are the differences between these animals, lifestyle and function in the ecosystem

A rather interesting question is how many legs a spider has. A very large number of people confuse these animals with other arthropods, in particular insects or mites. Therefore, this article will give an answer not only to the question of how many paws a spider has, but also a comparison will be made with ticks, since the latter also belong to arachnids.

It is especially important to take into account the fact that the ability to distinguish our hero from a tick is also important in practice. In particular, the last are carriers of many diseases or simply provoke allergic reactions from the body.

Both that arachnid and the other have eight legs, but they can be distinguished even externally. What to say about the internal features associated with behavior or other aspects of his life. Well, let’s figure out from the very beginning what spiders are in order to figure out how to distinguish it from ticks.

Who are spiders?

Spiders are a fairly large detachment of arthropods that have at their disposal animals that live in different parts of our planet. How many of these animals are there? Only at the latitudes of the former USSR there are 2888 species. In some latitudes, they are not dangerous, they have eight legs or four pairs of paws (as we understand), this is one and the same. Spiders are mostly engaged in the creation of webs. The implementation of this difficult task is required of them because in such networks they catch prey.

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Therefore, they run with their dexterous legs to an insect caught in a net, and there they eat it. This is a brief description of these habits. What do spiders look like? No wonder many people confuse them with insects. To some extent they are very similarbecause they belong to arthropods. But to distinguish a spider from an insect is very simple. The latter has only six legs, while the spider has eight. This is the main difference. The body of spiders is a cephalothorax with an abdomen located at its other end.

What is the purpose of a spider’s web?

The web that spiders weave is intended not only for building trapping networks, but also for:

• building cocoons for eggs. In this case, the web is used as a building tool for the other side of life – its continuation. Actually, the construction of trapping webs by spiders is also a way to prolong life, because an individual dies when there is no food. But here we have in mind the maintenance of the integrity of the population. This function of the web has a much larger purpose;
• escape in case of danger. Here we are talking not so much about maintaining the integrity of the population, but about saving life. Thanks to the web, the spider can run away from something that poses a potential or obvious threat to it.

As you can see, the web is not only a means to attract prey, but also a protective mechanism. An example is the use of the web as a tool for building a cocoon. In this case pautina performs a protective function for offspring arthropod. As you can see, not just for the extraction of food, a web is needed.

What is the difference between a tick and a spider?

Ticks also belong to arachnids. Therefore, the tick is a kind of mini-spider. Nonetheless an ordinary person needs to be able to distinguish between these animals, since most of the eight-legged trapping net builders that we encounter are not very dangerous to humans. But ticks are much more dangerous. They are carriers of a number of diseases:

• tick-borne encephalitis. Inflammation of the brain, in which a person dies quickly enough;
• lyme disease. Inflammatory processes that affect the internal organs of a person;
• allergy. A tick bite can even end with anaphylactic shock, during which death can occur in a few minutes.

Naturally, not every tick is infected or can provoke allergic reactions. You should not panic when you see a tick on your body. Nonetheless you need to be able to distinguish an ordinary spider from a tickwhich is sometimes difficult to do. After you see tick bites in yourself, it is advisable to take a sample of the arachnid to the laboratory in order to identify the causative agents of these diseases, and consult a doctor yourself.

But how to distinguish a tick from its relative? In fact, the principle is very simple. Despite the fact that the tick also has 8 legs, this arthropod has only one large peritoneum. Also, if you look at spiders, for the most part they have a convex body. In ticks, it is flat (if the animal has not yet eaten blood). That is, to distinguish these two representatives of the arachnid family is quite simple. But there is one caveat. If the spider is small, then it is quite difficult to distinguish two segments in it. Only one can be seen. This factor must be taken into account.

In general, we understood that both types of animals have four pairs of legs. However, they differ in body and lifestyle. Indeed, unlike their relatives, ticks feed on blood people, and do not knit nets from the web. Not so tricky differences, it turns out, right?