Question: Why don't spiders stick to their webs?

Angus Cook answered on 23 Jun 2016:

You know, I don’t know…
Ok, I had to look at far too many pictures of spiders to research this so I hope it’s worth it:

Spiders can make different kinds of silk for their webs. They can choose to make sticky silk, or non-sticky silk (there are more kinds apparently, but that’s the important bit for us). They use the non-sticky stuff as structural silk, the lines that actually hold the web to wherever they’ve built it. They use the sticky stuff to create the ‘web’ effect by joining up the different structural bits of the web.

The bit they tend to sit/sleep in (in the middle) they usually don’t make sticky. It’s just the outer regions that they use the special sticky silk in.

When they’re walking across the sticky bits, they’re very careful, and only put the very tips of their legs in contact with the web. This helps make it easy for them to remove their leg from a sticky bit.

So why do insects get trapped? Well they usually go straight into the web, with their whole bodies hitting lots of strands at once. This large amount of contact is enough to stick them, and as they’re struggling their also probably getting more and more sticky web over them.

Spiders are also (I’ve learned) careful to clean themselves of any web fragments that might cause them to stick more easily.

I’ve learned something here today too 🙂