Study
An estimated 400–800 million tons of prey are annually killed by the global spider community
Nyffeler, Martin; Birkhofer, Klaus
The Science of Nature, 2017
Published estimates of spider biomass per unit area across biome types were combined with feeding-rate estimates from field and laboratory studies, then scaled globally using biome extent.
- Studied in
- Araneae
- Sample size
- global extrapolation from regional density and feeding-rate data
The global spider community was estimated to consume roughly 400–800 million tonnes of prey each year, most of it insects and springtails.
What it means
The authors' reading, and ours. Where they differ, that difference is the point.
How the authors put it
Spiders are a major, and generally underestimated, force structuring terrestrial invertebrate populations.
How NatureHQ reads it
The number circulates widely, usually stripped of its range and its method. It is an extrapolation built on two uncertain layers — how many spiders there are, and how much each eats — and the honest reading is "very large, order-of-magnitude" rather than a measurement. That does not make it useless: even the low end establishes spiders as one of the dominant invertebrate predators on land.
- A modelled global extrapolation, not a measurement, with wide bounds stated by the authors.
- Spider density estimates are sparse for tropical and canopy habitats.
- Feeding rates from confined studies may not reflect wild conditions.
What this study is used for on NatureHQ
One study can inform several subjects. Here is everywhere this one is cited.
Published by: Springer journalsPublished in a Springer journal.
doi.org/10.1007/s00114-017-1440-1
This reference was resolved automatically against Crossref and OpenAlex on 2026-08-11.
NatureHQ summarises research in its own words and does not reproduce published text. Reviewed 2026-08-09.