Nature Talk: “Eat Prey Love: The Secret Lives of Spiders”, January 18, 2024

The January meeting will feature a Nature Talk entitled “Eat Prey Love: The Secret Lives of Spiders”.  Our speaker will be Dr. Catherine Scott, an arachnologist and behavioural ecologist whose research is focused on the behaviour and communication of black widows and other spiders.  She completed her PhD at the University of Toronto and is currently a Postdoctoral Fellow at McGill University.

Catherine believes that there are far more reasons to be fascinated by spiders than to fear them. In this talk, she will provide a window into the private lives of spiders.  Catherine will highlight their remarkable strategies for predation and defense, the critical role that they play in food webs, and their weird and wonderful mating and parenting habits.  A former arachnophobe, she is passionate about trying to shift perceptions about these fascinating creatures by engaging in science communication online and in person. You can find more information about Catherine and her research at spiderbytes.org and join the Spider Hunters iNaturalist project by visiting spiderhunters.ca.