My mum and my two younger brothers, Sameer and Milind returned to Goa soon thereafter, but I stayed on with Grandpapa in Mumbai for a few more days, since I was to proceed from there directly to Chennai where I would spend the next two and a half months in the pleasant company of spiders, earthworms and my all-time favourites, crocodiles and snakes.

Chapter 9: Spiders My stint with vermiculture over, I had another fortnight of study with Dr K. Vijayalakshmi, whom my dad calls India's `Spider Woman'.

Instead Dad had phoned to say that the final arrangements for my stay at Croc Bank were still being finalised and that I could use the 10 days or so in between to learn what I could from Dr Vijayalakshmi about spiders, and the unusual use she intends to put them to.

The spiders that Dr Vijayalakshmi deals with are called giant crab spiders.

The spiders that Dr Vijayalakshmi deals with are called giant crab spiders.

These spiders do not build webs.

The spiders were a little smaller than their prey i.e. the cockroaches.

The cockroaches were fed once a week or so to the giant crab spiders.

Information about spiders such as their growth, hardiness, their eating habits, reproduction etc. are important indicators of the species of spiders that can be kept in houses as predators for cockroaches.

27th November: Watched how Selvan separated baby spiders from their mother, placing each baby in a separate container.

Spent the afternoon catching flies to feed to some of the older spiders.

Today I only did identifying of different species of spiders.

Put 2 spiders to mate and made my observations.

6th December: Did feeding of baby spiders first.

But that's just what spiders are!

Some species, such as the cave spiders, are totally blind.

They can eat insects, small birds, mammals and reptiles, including poisonous snakes and other spiders, which they first subdue with their poison.

Many spiders spin webs to capture their prey.

However spiders also have other means of capturing their prey.

Still others feed on other spiders only and are called pirate spiders.

Still others feed on other spiders only and are called pirate spiders.

Some species of male spiders may patiently wait near the web of a female spider for weeks until she has caught a prey, and then mate with her while she is busy feeding on the prey.

Very few of us realize that spiders were, are and will be laying traps for insects even after man has finally disappeared from the earth.

How to Rear Spiders Spiders have cannibalistic tendencies, i.e. if two or more are kept in one container, they will prey on each other.

Spiders will tolerate moderate room temperature.