Conservationists weave their magic to save rare spider
An attractive spider threatened with extinction has made a comeback on Dorset heathland thanks to concerted conservation efforts, reports Charlie Elder
SPIDERS may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but there is one species sure to melt even the hardest of hearts.
The ladybird spider (pictured above) is one of our most spectacular looking invertebrates – a velvety little red-andblack heathland species patterned with ladybird-like dots.
It is also one of our rarest spiders and has been brought back from the brink of extinction thanks to concerted conservation efforts.
A dedicated ‘Back from the Brink’ project to save this Dorset species is drawing to a close, but its work over several years to help boost the population of this gem of a spider across its former heathland home has proven a success.
For more than 70 years the ladybird spider was feared extinct in Britain until a few were discovered hanging on at a single site in Dorset in 1980. Just seven individuals were found in an area the size of a tennis court.
They are a secretive species and hard to spot as they don’t spend their days suspended on webs in full view, but instead live at ground level, ambushing passing insects from silklined burrows. The females and immature spiders are dark all over while the males sport a glorious red abdomen marked with dots a bit like those on a dice.
Much of this scarcity’s lowland heathland habitat has been lost down the decades and the conservation drive has focussed on collecting and caring for spiders over winter, then translocating them in spring to suitable sites in order to increase their numbers and range.
Scientists deployed a low-tech method of transferring the spiders, using empty plastic mineral water bottles which provided the ideal shape and size for spiders to make their nests in.
The bottles were filled with heather and moss and captured spiders were placed inside and monitored while they settled in and made a web, before the bottles were buried in holes in the ground, enabling the spiders to colonise new areas.
Work has been ongoing for years to save the ladybird spider, but the Back from the Brink project, led by invertebrate conservation charity Buglife and project officer Caroline Kelly, has ensured a more secure future for the species and raised its public profile – with the species featuring on Springwatch in 2020.
Back from the Brink is a Lotteryfunded partnership working to prevent the extinction of threatened species in England and has also had success in expanding Devon’s isolated population of the rare narrow-headed ant.
An article in Buglife’s latest membership magazine, The Buzz, says: “Thanks to the efforts of our project partners and local volunteers, the number of ladybird spider populations across the Dorset heaths has now been increased to a total of 19, with hundreds of individual spiders, representing a dramatic turnaround for a spider which had declined to just a few individuals.”
It said that establishing new ladybird spider populations was “a delicate business”, requiring site conditions to be just right and ensuring donor populations were robust enough to spare a few spiders for translocation by licensed experts.
Buglife added: “This is just the beginning, of course, as years of careful monitoring and habitat management is essential to the species’ survival.”
A network of local volunteers have been trained to monitor and manage the spider sites, while the RSPB Arne reserve in Dorset has established a spider web installation and information boards near its visitor centre.
Thanks to the project, this striking species has captured the imagination of nature lovers across the UK. More than that, it has shown that funded conservation efforts can make all the difference – and that even spiders can win new friends.