I uploaded a video showing the initiation of bridging lines in Pholcus phalangioides (Fuesslin, 1775) to Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRkK0aqBL6M
| Aerial
dispersal using silk ("ballooning") in well documented for several
spiders families, but whether it occurs in pholcids and related
families is controversial. In a review from 2005 on ballooning in
spiders and
other animals, Pholcidae are marked as a “family in which ballooning
has been observed”. Here I review the evidence for this, and conclude
that there is no reliable data showing that Pholcidae have a behaviour
that evolved to function specifically for getting airborne. Ballooning
may in fact be absent in a large clade of spiders including Pholcidae
(i.e., Haplogynae, or Synspermiata). Other behaviours that share
certain characteristics with ballooning and that may accidentally
result in airborne specimens occur in Pholcidae: bridging and dropping
on a line. Below is a photo of a Pholcus
baguio male initiating a bridging line (arrow). I uploaded a video showing the initiation of bridging lines in Pholcus phalangioides (Fuesslin, 1775) to Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRkK0aqBL6M |