Why do female mates eat mates before mating?

A new study finds that the "personality" of a spider can influence whether it decides to eat a potential mate immediately or delay it after finishing mating or forgiving death. mates.

In some spider species, females are notorious for their habit of eating mates after sex. However, in reality, there are still spiders that even "re-feed" potential mates before mating takes place.

Scientists have come up with a series of guesses about why so many spiders develop a habit of "re-feeding" their partners. For female individuals, meat lovers can bring a nutritional advantage or help eliminate unwanted "fathers" .

For males, sacrifices can be made to ensure that their genes will be passed on to the next generation. For example, in some species of spiders, males leave their shackles as their detachable penis inside the female body after the "love" to drive away the sperm of the enemy.

"Personality"decides whether female spiders choose to eat potential mates before mate.(Photo: BBC)

However, the benefits of carnivorous love are more ambiguous when " wild" spiders devour their mates of all sizes indiscriminately, not even "mind it" with them. Researchers from Spain's Drylands Experimental Station (EEZA) have examined whether certain personality traits, such as aggression and aggression, affect how to treat the spider with male spiders approaching or not.

The team captured 99 males and 88 Iberian tarantula Lycosa hispanica spiders . They then classify female spiders into "aggressive" or "gentle" groups by observing how they respond to their prey and appetite.

The female spider group, all are "virgin" , are then released with the males. The results showed that meek females are more likely to mate before attacking males. They also tend to eat males that are weaker and prefer sex with superior males.

Meanwhile, aggressive females kill males regardless of whether they are strong or weak, even before mating. This implies, the aggressive nature has caused these female spiders to lose the ability to distinguish potential partners as sources of sperm or food sources and "re-eat" male spiders indiscriminately.

The researchers concluded that it was the "personality" that determined the attitude of the female spider to prey and potential mates. The ferocious will make female spiders become voracious and "re-eat" male spiders regardless of whether they mate or not.