Survival strategies.
Spiders use many strategies to protect themselves from their enemies. One of the most amazing of these is called autotomy. This is the spider's ability to self-amputate a leg that has been grabbed by a bird or other predator. Usually the leg breaks off close to the body, at the coxa-trochanter joint. Even more amazingly, juvenile spiders can regenerate their legs - a tiny, segmented leg grows within the coxal stump and appears at the next moult. Other strategies include behavioural ploys, like direct threat displays of warning colours on the spider's body, or escaping a predator by dropping quickly away on a silk dragline and playing dead on the ground.
Identifying Redback Spiders.
…
