Journal
JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL BIOLOGY
Volume 208, Issue 20, Pages 3925-3931Publisher
COMPANY BIOLOGISTS LTD
DOI: 10.1242/jeb.01861
Keywords
Thondsus spectabilis; Apis mellifera; communication; vision; colour signal; ultraviolet
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Australian crab spiders Thomisus spectabilis sit on the petals of flowers and ambush prey such as honeybees. White-coloured T. spectabilis reflect in the UV (UV+ spiders) and previous research has shown that their presence, curiously, attracts honeybees to daisies. We applied an UV-absorber (Parsol (R)) to create UV-absorbing (UV-) spiders that did not reflect any light below 395 run wavelength. These physical changes of visual signals generated by crab spiders caused honeybees to avoid flowers with UV- spiders on their petals. They also affected the perception of UV- spiders by honeybees and a potential avian predator (blue tits). Compared to UV+ spiders, UV- spiders produced less excitation of the UV-photoreceptors in honeybees and blue tits, which translated into a reduced UV-receptor contrast and a reduced overall colour contrast between UV- spiders and daisy petals. Our results reveal that a clean physical elimination of reflection in the UV range affects perception in predators and prey and ultimately changes the behaviour of prey.
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