Creepy!
Bat-eating spiders are common and apparently creep around every continent, except Antarctica, devouring various bat species, according to a study detailed in the journal PLOS ONE on March 13, 2013, by Martin Nyffeler, a senior lecturer in zoology at the University of Basel in Switzerland, and Mirjam Knörnschild, of the University of Ulm in Germany.
Here, a dead bat (Rhinolophus cornutus orii) caught in the web of a female Nephila pilipes on Amami-Oshima Island, Japan.
Lunch in a palm swamp
A volant juvenile proboscis bat (Rhynchonycteris naso) entangled in web of Nephila clavipes photographed in a palm swamp forest near Madre de Dios, Peru.
Dead and entangled
Dead bat entangled in web of a female Nephila clavipes in a tropical rain forest in the middle of the Rio Dulce River Canyon near Livingston, Guatemala.
Feeding on a bat
A small bat (superfamily Rhinolophoidea) entangled in the web of a Nephila pilipes spider at the top of the Cockatoo Hill near Cape Tribulation, Queensland, Australia. The spider pressed its mouth against the dead, wrapped bat, indicating that it was feeding on it.
Still alive, but trapped
Live bat trapped in the web of the spider Nephilengys cruentata in a thatch roof at Nisela Lodge, Swaziland.
Hanging out in Hong Kong
Dead vespertilionid bat entangled in the web of a female Nephila pilipes in the Aberdeen Country Park, Hong Kong.
Entangled
Dead vespertilionid bat entangled in the web of a female Nephila pilipes in the Aberdeen Country Park, Hong Kong.
Feeding time
Adult female Avicularia urticans spider feeding on a greater sac-winged bat (Saccopteryx bilineata) on the side of a palm tree near the Rio Yarapa, Peru.
In Costa Rica
Adult proboscis bat (Rhynchonycteris naso) entangled in web of Argiope savignyi at the La Selva Biological Station, northern Costa Rica.
Entangled Myotis bat
Dead bat (Myotis sp.) entangled in a web of Nephila clavipes in La Sirena, Corcovado National Park, Costa Rica.
Orb Web
Dead bat (presumably Centronycteris centralis) entangled in an orb-web in Belize.
