气候变化让蜘蛛变得凶恶

气候变化让蜘蛛变得凶恶

And the angry spiders shall inherit the Earth.

愤怒的蜘蛛将来到地球。

At least, that's the conclusion Canadian scientists came to after watching how spiders in storm-prone regions responded to extreme weather events.

至少，这是加拿大科学家在观察了易受暴风雨袭击地区的蜘蛛对极端天气事件的反应后得出的结论。

Spiders aren't happy about climate change either. (Photo: RCH Photography/Shutterstock)

Although climate change may not spell more storms, scientists suspect it may ratchet up the intensity — and lead to more extreme weather outbursts known as "black swan" events.

尽管气候变化可能不会带来更多风暴，但科学家们怀疑，它可能会加剧风暴强度，并导致更多被称为“黑天鹅”事件的极端天气爆发。

"It is tremendously important to understand the environmental impacts of these 'black swan' weather events on evolution and natural selection," lead author Jonathan Pruitt of McMaster University notes in a release.

“了解这些‘黑天鹅’天气事件对进化和自然选择的环境影响是非常重要的，”麦克马斯特大学的首席作者乔纳森·普鲁特在一份新闻稿中指出。

For creepy-crawler kind, it's nothing short of a tsunami, devastating colonies. And who should be left to pick up the pieces? Certainly, not the mellow spiders. Researchers noted the aggressive ones — the spiders that had no qualms about cannibalizing their own kind, hoarding supplies and attacking anyone that got in their way — were the ones to rebuild.

对于爬行动物来说，这简直就是海啸，毁灭性的殖民地。谁应该留下来收拾残局呢?当然，成熟的蜘蛛不会。研究人员指出，攻击性强的蜘蛛——对同类的蚕食毫不犹豫，囤积物资，攻击任何挡道的人——才是重建家园的人。

In other words, it was survival of the meanest.

换句话说，这是最卑鄙的生存。

The scientists compared colonies before and after they were hit by three major tropical storms in 2018. The team also monitored a control group of spiders that didn't experience any extreme weather. They were the lucky ones.

科学家们比较了2018年三场主要热带风暴袭击前和袭击后的蚁群。研究小组还对一组没有经历过任何极端天气的蜘蛛进行了监测。它们是幸运的。

Anelosimus studiosus can share its web with hundreds in a colony — until the going gets tough. (Photo: Judy Gallagher [CC BY 2.0]/Flickr)

When the storms broke out, smashing their house of silk, it was no more Mr. Nice Spider. Communal living, researchers note, went out the window, as two types of spiders emerged: the aggressive, downright mean ones and the peace-loving hippies.

当暴风雨袭来，把他们的丝屋砸得粉碎时，那不再是尼斯先生了。研究人员指出，随着两种蜘蛛的出现，群居的生活方式消失了:好斗、刻薄和爱好和平的嬉皮士。

Most spider colonies already have representatives of each, often determining the overall aggressiveness of a colony. But when push comes to tsunami, the mellow members of the population get shoved aside — and the killing and marauding and eating-each-other's-babies begins.

大多数蜘蛛群落已经有各自的代表，通常决定了一个群落的整体攻击性。但当海啸来袭时，温和的居民被推到一边，杀戮、掠夺和吃掉彼此的婴儿就开始了。

It's "Hunger Games," spider-style. But most importantly, it's a survival mechanism. The scientists noted that the aggro-spiders were "better at acquiring resources when scarce but are also more prone to infighting when deprived of food for long periods of time or when colonies become overheated."

这是蜘蛛侠风格的《饥饿游戏》。但最重要的是，这是一种生存机制。科学家们指出，aggroo -spider“在资源匮乏时更善于获取资源，但在长时间缺乏食物或群落过热时也更容易发生内讧。”

And to better equip future generations for "black swan" events, spiders passed on those survival tools — a.k.a. the killing and pillaging gene — to their offspring.

为了让后代更好地应对“黑天鹅”事件，蜘蛛把这些生存工具——也就是猎杀和掠夺基因——传给了后代。

"Tropical cyclones likely impact both of these stressors by altering the numbers of flying prey and increasing sun exposure from a more open canopy layer," Pruitt explains. "Aggressiveness is passed down through generations in these colonies, from parent to daughter, and is a major factor in their survival and ability to reproduce."

普鲁伊特解释说:“热带气旋可能通过改变飞行猎物的数量和增加从更开阔的林冠层暴露在阳光下的时间来影响这两种压力源。”“攻击性在这些殖民地代代相传，从父母传给女儿，是它们生存和繁殖能力的一个重要因素。”

In other words, climate change is giving us an angry new world. And spiders are learning how to navigate it, no matter what it takes.

换句话说，气候变化给了我们一个愤怒的新世界。蜘蛛正在学习如何在这片水域中航行，不管需要付出什么代价。