Monica Mowery

Monica Mowery published two new papers, one in Animal Behaviour and one in Behavioural Ecology, from her research on invasive widow spiders at Ben-Gurion University.

Monica explains, “in the first study, we found that dispersal ability and size shifted in invasive brown widow spider populations across Israel and the US. Newly-invasive Negev populations were faster to disperse and larger. In the second study, we found that invasive brown widow spiders were less susceptible and a less-preferred host for a major enemy, an egg sac parasitoid wasp, compared to the native white widow spider, which may aid the brown widow’s invasive spread.”