A ballooning spider showing a tiptoe stance on a daisy Michael Hutchinson
It鈥檚 been a mystery since before the time that Charles Darwin observed spiders launching from the HMS Beagle with 鈥渦naccountable rapidity鈥, carried aloft by silken threads. It now seems that spiders fly using the force of atmospheric electricity.
Many spiders are excellent fliers, despite not having wings. They 鈥渂alloon鈥 through the air using silk fibres which act like a paraglider, travelling hundreds of miles and reaching heights of 4.5 kilometres. It was assumed that they took to the air on the breeze, but Erica Morley at the…
