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Spiders

Araneae

Spiders (order Araneae) are air-breathing arthropods that have eight legs and chelicerae with fangs that inject venom. Spiders are found worldwide on every continent except for Antarctica and have become established in nearly every habitat with the exceptions of air and sea colonization. Anatomically, spiders differ from other arthropods in that the usual body segments are fused into two tagmata, the cephalothorax and the abdomen, and joined by a small, cylindrical pedicel. Their abdomens bear appendages that have been modified into spinnerets that extrude silk from up to six types of silk glands within their abdomen. Spider webs vary widely in size, shape and the amount of sticky thread used.

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