By Jean Thomas
Often as I walk with the dog, I notice things and they inspire stray thought trains. On this particular day, I noticed a spider web woven in the grass and a contrail dissipating in the sky above it. Both inspire diversions. The spider web, first: I once had a neighbor who was fond of conspiracy theories and shared them with anyone too slow to slip away. The theory was born in 1986 amidst a flurry of similar misguided observations. Chernobyl was the site of the worst nuclear accident known so far in our history. It was the result of human error and laid waste to a region of Ukraine almost forty years ago. The theories have spread and grown in that period, but the one about the spiders is my favorite. This neighbor was of the opinion that the round, mostly flat webs we see on the lawn in the early morning, usually after a dew, were a result of the escaped radiation from the Chernobyl meltdown that had drifted around the globe and arrived on our grass. Obviously she had never noticed these before the catastrophe in Ukraine. I will admit that I had never observed them closely before she pointed it out. Frankly, the actual natural history story about these clever little guys is more interesting. These spiders in North America are members of about fourteen species that inhabit lawns, fields and woodlands. They are smaller and daintier than the scary wolf spiders, and not really a risk for bites. Their lifespan is never longer than a year, and they are pretty bashful. We see their webs, which look like a small plate that slopes down into a funnel where the spider waits discretely. For those of us who like to look closely at things like spiders, the grass spiders have a distinct pair of “spinnerets” that they use to make their webs into intricate traps. The webs aren't sticky, just tangly, I guess. The spiders are very quick and inject the victim with venom to subdue them before they eat them. They eat ants, small insects including an occasional mosquito, and flies and beetles. They are not at all dangerous and serve as food to lizards, birds and larger insects... including wasps.
This same neighbor had the contrail theory in her repertoire of conspiracies. This one is more widespread than the spider one. It goes like this: those stripes left behind as jet planes fly overhead are an intentional dispersal of chemicals meant to harm a population beneath the flight path. Each conspiracy enthusiast will happily tell you who these evil agencies are and sometimes what chemicals are being sprayed and why. I live where I can observe traffic from the Albany airport. Contrails are frequent and I have always enjoyed seeing the ways they fall apart and merge with whatever clouds they pass through. I remember the eerie lack of contrails during the times after 9/11/01 and the Covid pandemic. No planes droning above and no trails in the sky. Contrary to theory, the contrails are vapor emissions from the planes, much like exhaust from a vehicle. I have always been of the opinion that those who would dream up such elaborate schemes are rarely capable of bringing them into reality. Okay, that's what I hope, anyway. Penn State has a great site about the spiders at: https://extension.psu.edu/grass-spiders and the EPA has a good site about contrails at: https://www.epa.gov/regulations-emissions-vehicles-and-engines/Contrails.
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