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| A crab spider (Thomisidae). |
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New Guinean natives use spider webs for fishing nets. In 1709, French naturalist René-Antoine Ferchault de Reaumur tried to make stockings and gloves from material collected from egg sacs. He gave up; too many spiders for too little silk. Burt Wilder, a Civil War surgeon, built little devices to hold spiders stationery while he gently drew silk from them, but came to the same conclusion: he figured it would take 5,000 spinners to get enough material for a single dress. Up until World War II spider silk was used for the cross hairs in gun sights and optical instruments.
Working with spiders is a serious challenge. Cannibalism means that these silk producers, unlike silkworms, cannot be “farmed” in close quarters. The silk is hard to work with, too.
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