Publication Date
2019
Document Type
Thesis
Committee Members
Thomas Rooney (Advisor), Katie Hossler (Committee Member), John Stireman III (Committee Member)
Degree Name
Master of Science (MS)
Abstract
In this study, I examined how the spatiotemporal distribution of spider webs and diet changed in a lake riparian zone with increasing distance from an aquatic resource. I surveyed twenty, one-hundred meter transects along the perimeters of Sanford and Escanaba lakes (Wisconsin). Overall, spider web abundance was highest near the lakes and decreased moving into the adjacent forest. Horizontal orb webs, vertical orb webs, and mesh webs showed strong negative relationships with distance from the lakes. Aquatic insects composed an average 36-64% of spider diet for all spider families throughout the riparian zone, suggesting that some spider families are selecting habitats where aquatic prey availability is high. However, all are passively capturing aquatic prey as an abundant resource. These results demonstrate the value of riparian habitats to terrestrial communities and show that spiders could provide a model for assessing the reciprocal flow of allochthonous inputs between aquatic and terrestrial communities.
Page Count
51
Department or Program
Department of Biological Sciences
Year Degree Awarded
2019
Copyright
Copyright 2019, some rights reserved. My ETD may be copied and distributed only for non-commercial purposes and may not be modified. All use must give me credit as the original author.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
