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"In a species where there is no risk from sexual cannibalism, males are not choosy." says PhD student Luciana Baruffaldi (all photos by Ken Jones)

When choosing a mate is literally (yes, literally) a matter of life and death

Research shows male black widow spiders can smell hunger of females

Forget worrying about a sense of humour or an attractive personality. For male black widow spiders, finding an appropriate mate may come down to avoiding being eaten alive. 

New research by PhD student Luciana Baruffaldi and Professor Maydianne Andrade of the University of Toronto Scarborough鈥檚 department of biological sciences shows the reason male black widow spiders prefer well-fed female mates may be to avoid the risk of sexual cannibalism.

The research, which was supported by an NSERC Discovery Grant, will be published in the upcoming edition of the journal Animal Behaviour and is already making headlines around the world. (.)

鈥淲e knew male black widow spiders seek out well-fed females in nature, but we didn鈥檛 know if it was because they were looking for better quality mates or if it was to avoid being eaten,鈥 said Andrade.   

photo of two spidersTo test the theory Baruffaldi and Andrade compared the response of males to female sex pheromones in two closely related species; the western black widow and the Australian redback. The two species provide an ideal comparison because they share similar reproductive behaviours except for some key differences. Even if female redbacks are hungry they will not eat males until after they鈥檝e mated. In fact, male redbacks are complicit and do nothing to avoid being eaten because it does not prevent them from fathering offspring. 

This is not the case for male black widow spiders who will avoid hungry females because the females鈥 need to feed will trump any urge to mate. 

鈥淲e found that male black widow spiders had a very strong sexual response to pheromones from well-fed females, but basically ignored pheromones from hungry females. On the other hand, redback males reacted strongly to both types of females,鈥 said Baruffaldi. 

鈥淭his tells us that in a species where there is no risk from sexual cannibalism, males are not choosy.鈥 

The laboratory study extracted sex pheromones 鈥 chemical signals or 鈥榩erfume鈥 produced by females 鈥 located in their silk to test male responses. They were able to determine pheromones contain information that males could use to tell whether a female has eaten recently or not 鈥 but only male black widows, under the threat of cannibalism, make use of this important information. 

(.)

Don Campbell is a writer with the University of Toronto Scarborough.

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