Petrunkevitch is writing to the readers of Scientific American. This essay was published in the August 1952 issue of the magazine. Petrunkevitch must have had a strong background in arachnids, for he describes to us in great detail the behaviors and characteristics of the tarantula. He tells us where tarantulas live. “Most tar

Petrunkevitch describes in great detail the defense mechanisms of the tarantula. Although tarantulas have virtually no sense of sight, and poor hearing, they have an amazing sense of touch. “The eyesight of tarantulas is poor, being limited to a sensing of change in the intensity of light and to the perception of moving objects. They apparently have little or no sense of hearing, for a hungry tarantula will pay no attention to a loudly chirping cricket placed in its cage unless the insect happens to touch one of its legs.”(Petrunkevitch 630) Not only does the tarantula posses an uncanny sense of touch, but also great speed and reflexes. “At the touch of a cricket’s antennae the tarantula seizes the insect so swiftly that a motion picture taken at the rate of 64 frames per second shows only the result and not the process of capture.”(Petrunkevitch 631)

antulas live in the tropics, but several species occur in the temperate zone and a few are common in the

of a tarantula is. “After mating, the male dies in a few weeks, but a female lives much longer and can mate several years in succession.”(Petrunkevitch 630) He even describes how many eggs female tarantulas can lay, and the process in which they lay those eggs. “A fertilized female tarantula lays from 200 to 400 eggs at a time; thus it is possible for a single tarantula to produce sever thousand young.”(Petrunkevitch 630)

The female digger wasp produces only one egg at a time. In order to survive its gestation period, the egg must be attached to the abdomen of a

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