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Even a strong armor is of no help: here a Garden Chafer (Phyllopertha horticola) was killed. The crab spider did not kill the beetle from behind, as the picture may suggest, but from the front, as usual. A beetle's armor is relatively thin in its joints, which is where the spider needs to grab the insect and inject its poison. Misumena vatia usually grabs an insect from the front by its neck. In the picture, the spider is now injecting enzymes into the hind part of the dead beetle. They dissolve the interior of the beetle and digests it into a liquid, that the spider can suck. This is how spiders live of insects. |
