Why is the Diving Bell Spider the Coolest Spider on Earth?

I guess it’s a matter of opinion which spider is the coolest spider on Earth, but I think we can all agree that the diving bell spider is pretty darn cool. I first learned about it in a kids book about spiders that my 4-year old grabbed at the library and have been reading all about it ever since. I’m not a huge fan of creepy-crawlies, but can make an exception for this one.

The diving bell spider is the only spider on the planet that spends most of its life underwater. However, it still needs to breathe oxygen, so how can it survive?

Here’s the cool part. The diving bell spider has a silvery sac made mostly of incredibly strong silk and hydrogel. This sac carries air for the spider! Not only that, the sac acts a little bit like a fish’s gills to keep a steady supply of oxygen handy. Oxygen can flow in and carbon dioxide can flow out, keeping an ideal ratio for the spider to survive. The diving bell spider only needs to surface about once a day to replenish the air supply!

The diving bell spider gets its name because its sac looks like a diving bell, which is a rigid structure historically used to help divers explore underwater will keeping a space, pressurized space for humans, like in the picture below.

Diving bell for saturated divings, shared with a Creative Commons 3.0 license by Ciacho5

I happen to think the diving bell spider’s bell is much more interesting, so I encourage you to look at pictures of it.

What animals do you find fascinating?

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diving_bell_spider

https://www.nature.com/articles/news.2011.357

https://www.newswise.com/articles/how-diving-bell-spiders-can-breathe-under-water