Silk Investment in Gifts By Males of the Nuptial Feeding Spider Pisaura Mirabilis (Araneae: Pisauridae).

Adult males of the hunting spider Pisaura mirabilis wrap up prey with silk and pass these nuptial gifts to females prior to copulation. The females digest the nuptial gifts, including the silk, during mating. Laboratory experiments were carried out to determine the amount of silk males of P. mirabilis invest in nuptial gifts, and its possible role in sexual reproduction. The amount of silk was always small, indicating that the silk of the nuptial gift has little nutritional value for females. Males that had more time to wrap up the prey produced a larger amount of silk. Starved males required more time than satiated males to produce a given amount of silk. A larger male body size had a positive effect on the amount of silk. In general, the size of the prey used for nuptial gifts had no influence on the amount of silk. However, due to handling problem, smaller males produced no silk for very large flies. Females took more time to digest a nuptial gift with a larger amount of silk than a nuptial gift with a smaller amount of silk. A possible interpretation of the adaptive significance of wrapping is that males use silk to prolong the copulation time during mating

Increased insertion number leads to increased sperm transfer and fertilization success in a nursery web spider

Across animals, a male\u27s fitness is largely dictated by his ability to fertilize eggs; and there exists a plethora of male adaptations associated with increasing fertilization success. In the nursery web spider, Pisaurina mira, males restrain females prior to and during copulation by wrapping them with silk. Previous research demonstrates that copulatory silk wrapping reduces a male\u27s chance of being sexually cannibalized and increases the number of sperm transfer opportunities (termed insertions) that a male can achieve within a mating. While avoiding cannibalism provides an obvious survival benefit to males, the impact of insertion number on male fitness remains unknown. This study tested the hypothesis that increased insertion number realized through copulatory silk wrapping increases (1) the quantity of sperm transferred and (2) fertilization success. To accomplish this, we directly quantified the amount of sperm in male pedipalps (i.e. the male sperm storage organ) before mating and after obtaining one or two insertions. We also, indirectly quantified fertilization success by measuring the number of hatched offspring when males were capable of achieving one versus two insertions within a mating. In support of our hypotheses, we found that males transfer roughly twice the amount of sperm when achieving two insertions compared to one. We additionally found that the amount of sperm transferred is negatively related to female size. In terms of offspring number, females obtaining two insertions had more offspring compared to females obtaining only one insertion. These results show that males achieve a fertilization benefit from increased insertion number, which is obtained through the male behavior of copulatory silk wrapping

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Panhandling and the First Amendment: How Spider-Man is Reducing the Quality of Life in New York City

Recently, New York and other cities have taken steps to regulate panhandling activity in their communities. These regulations are informed by Broken Windows policing, which emphasizes addressing quality-of-life issues as a strategy for reducing crime. Yet government-imposed limitations on panhandling raise concerns about whether such measures violate panhandlers’ First Amendment rights. This note explores whether it is possible to separate the act of panhandling—defined as approaching a stranger in public and requesting immediate and gratuitous cash payment for oneself—from expression that is protected by the First Amendment. It concludes that, based on a concurrence from Justice Kennedy in International Society for Krishna Consciousness v. Lee, panhandling regulations should not be viewed as content-based speech restrictions, but rather should receive a lesser level of judicial scrutiny

Panhandling and the First Amendment: How Spider-Man is Reducing the Quality of Life in New York City

Recently, New York and other cities have taken steps to regulate panhandling activity in their communities. These regulations are informed by Broken Windows policing, which emphasizes addressing quality-of-life issues as a strategy for reducing crime. Yet government-imposed limitations on panhandling raise concerns about whether such measures violate panhandlers’ First Amendment rights. This note explores whether it is possible to separate the act of panhandling—defined as approaching a stranger in public and requesting immediate and gratuitous cash payment for oneself—from expression that is protected by the First Amendment. It concludes that, based on a concurrence from Justice Kennedy in International Society for Krishna Consciousness v. Lee, panhandling regulations should not be viewed as content-based speech restrictions, but rather should receive a lesser level of judicial scrutiny