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Response to dangerous animals in Europe and Africa - attention and emotions
Štolhoferová, Iveta ; Frynta, Daniel (advisor) ; Telenský, Petr (referee) ; Burda, Hynek (referee)
The focus of this thesis on the emotions elicited by certain animals and the attentional bias towards these animals in two completely different human populations - the Czech Republic and the Republic of Somaliland. Animals have long been at the center of human interest, yet our knowledge of what emotions animals evoke is surprisingly incomplete, especially outside of the so-called WEIRD societies. We found that snakes, scorpions, and large carnivores elicited the greatest fear in Somalis. Among Czechs, however, spiders were also among the most feared animals. Both populations were the least afraid of beetles and grasshoppers. Spontaneous attentional bias during free viewing of two simultaneously presented images reflected both this cross-cultural difference and agreement. When a scorpion and a spider were presented together, the Somalis looked significantly more at the scorpion, but the Czechs distributed their attention more evenly between the two animals, although a slight bias in favor of the scorpion was apparent. In contrast, when the grasshopper was presented with a spider or a scorpion, both Czechs and Somalis looked much less at the grasshopper. In the case of snakes, a stimulus highly feared by both Somalis and Czechs, we focused on the effect of the threatening posture on the spontaneous...
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Karyotype evolution of cobweb spiders (Araneae: Theridiidae)
Večeřová, Hana ; Forman, Martin (advisor) ; Dolejš, Petr (referee)
Spiders (Araneae) are diversified order of the subphylum Chelicerata. Majority of the order belongs to group Entelegynae, as well as representatives of cobweb spider family (Theridiidae). Their noteworthy genus is Latrodectus, also known as "black widows". This thesis summarizes basic information about the genus, it's biology, phylogenetics and cytogenetics, with an overlap to genomics of cobweb spiders and their related species. Even though spiders' cytogenetics is an interesting field, particularly due to the occurance of unusual systems of sex chromosomes, some of the questions remain unanswered. A leading trend in entelegyne spiders is the reduction of diploid counts, where most mechanisms of the process remains unclear. Main aim of the thesis was to verify a potential of cobweb spiders as a model system for future studies of these changes. The genus Latrodectus may have potential because of showing suprisingly diverse karyotypes, which is unusual in Entelegynae. Despite their popularity, quality of karyotype data is poor and deserves to be revised. Nevertheless, the cosmopolitan L. geometricus is purposed as a keypart of promising model system for comparison of genome with modern cytogenomic approaches. Establishment of such model system could adress the questions about mechanism of karyotype...
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Vliv intenzity managementu umělé obnovy dubových porostů na interakci mezi pavouky a jejich kořistí
Kárych, Jan
The aim of the research was to determine the effects of intensive management carried out by milling and full-scale treatment and extensive management during the preparation and care of artificially regenerated oak stands on the trophic networks of web spiders and their prey, which are sensitive to changes in the vegetation cover and canopy structure or openness. The procedure for evaluating the results was divided into two parts. Food webs were investigated in the field by collecting spiders and their webs with prey in plots during a total of two collections in June and August of 2021. Subsequently, from the collected samples, individual representatives of spiders were determined at the level of species or genera. The prey of spiders was determined at the level of orders or suborders. The obtained data were processed using statistical methods and evaluated. The results show that the amount of data was not optimal, but it confirmed the assumption that the total numbers of spiders and their prey were significantly higher on unmilled areas, as well as the species diversity, than on milled areas.
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The Role of Spinneret Glands and Specific Features of Silk Production in Tarantulas (Araneae: Mygalomorphae)
Sýkorová, Barbora ; Říhová, Dagmar (advisor) ; Dolejš, Petr (referee)
This bachelor thesis is a review of scientific papers, monographs and internet sources, which focus mainly on the spinning apparatus and silk production in Mygalomorphae. The thesis is enriched with pictures that could help the reader to better navigate the topic. Spiders belong to arthropods. They are divided into the infraorders Araneomorphae, Mesothelae and Mygalomorphae. Spiders have a body divided into a cephalothorax and an opisthosoma, connected by a pedicel. The digestive system of spiders is specific in that it only allows them to take in liquid food. Almost all spiders have developed venom glands. Spinning activity is a very important feature of spiders. An important part of the spinning apparatus in the spinning nipples varies from family to family, but usually there is a reduction in their number. The basic functional and structural units of the spinning apparatus are the spinning glands, which transform on the surface of the spinning nipples into spigots, through which the silk is expelled to the surface. The silk is used by spiders to form snare or to form protective egg cases- cocoons. In the Czech Republic we can see three species of the family Atypidae (genus Atypus): Atypus affinis, Atypus piceus and Atypus muralis. KEYWORDS Spiders, silk glands, spigot, spidroin, family Atypidae,...
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Impact of Different Lawn Maintenance on Terrestrial Invertebrate Biodiversity
Klán, Jan ; Říhová, Dagmar (advisor) ; Škodová, Jana (referee)
This paper focuses on differences in the composition of invertebrate communities in grasslands with different management of green space management. It was carried out on four research plots with different management types (no-till, regular treatment with a power mower, treatment with a scythe, treatment with grazing). The main objective of the work is to demonstrate, using a sample of captured spiders, centipedes, millipedes, earwigs, and leafhoppers, which form of grassland habitat management is the most appropriate in terms of biodiversity richness. Other sub-objectives were to obtain local data on the variability of soil moisture in the study plots, air humidity and temperature. These values will illustrate an idea of the habitat of the captured animals. In terms of biodiversity, the grazed habitat proved to be the richest (a total of 84 species captured). This was followed by the no-mow habitat (83 species), mowed (76) and finally mowed with a mower (74). Mowed habitat was the poorest. In all habitats, the highest number of spider species was always captured, followed by crickets, and an order of magnitude fewer millipedes, centipedes, millipedes, and starlings were captured. One species of chrysalis was captured, which is listed on the Red List of Threatened Species of the Czech Republic. This...
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Synanthropic Animals and Their Use in High School Teaching
Hušková, Kateřina ; Říhová, Dagmar (advisor) ; Škodová, Jana (referee)
The diploma thesis deals with synanthropic animals occurring in the home and school environment in the summer and autumn months and their use in teaching. It is divided in two main parts. The first half of the work describes in details already discovered synanthropic animal species during summer (June, July 2021) and autumn (October, November 2021) collecting in the buildings of Grammar school Teplice in the centre of Teplice, also in a family house and it's surroundings in the suburbs of Teplice. The overall results of the survey of both places showed a number of identical animals (eg Tegenaria domestica, Steatoda grossa or Musca domestica). The discovery of Scutigera coleoptrata and a large amount of Cheiracanthium mildei in the family house became a surprise. On the contrary, the occurrence of Columba livia on the school grounds and Pholcus phalangioides directly inside the school was expected. The second part of the diploma thesis describes and evaluates the results of tested students in the Teplice Grammar School. The testing served to find out students' knowledge of the topic of synanthropic animals. The results showed only partial knowledge of the topic, which needs to be further improved and developed by the students. Based on the results of testing, a six-hour seminar (divided into three...
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Succession of spider assemblages in quarries of Bohemian Karst
Siegelová, Eva ; Kubcová, Lenka (advisor) ; Korenko, Stanislav (referee)
In this thesis, the succession of spider assemblages in five limestone quarries of different ages in Bohemian Karst has been studied. The main goal of this paper was studying changes of spider assemblages along successional gradient. Furthermore, different environmental factors affecting spider communities and also assemblages of spider communites in different terraces of the quarry have been studied. Standardized methods (pitfall traps, hanging desk traps, shifting leaf litter, sweeping of herb vegetation, and beating shrubs) have been used for recording the highest possible richness of spiders. The results showed that position of the terraces and the age of the quarry do not affect species richness and density. Species density of epigeic spiders increased significantly with number of the plant species. The results showed that spiders do not have their own succession, but they are following vegetational succession. The environmental factors which affect species composition of spiders from the pitfall traps are positon of terraces, shading and moss cover. Although the age of the quarry was insignificant for spiders from pitfall traps, every quarry was inhabited by different spider communities. Shrubs and tree-dwelling spiders showed correlations with the age of the quarry. Data recorded from...
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Spiders as senders and receivers of antipredatory warning signals
Raška, Jan ; Exnerová, Alice (advisor) ; Korenko, Stanislav (referee) ; Krištín, Anton (referee)
The introductory part of this thesis sums up the state of knowledge on aposematism and mimicry, the effect of aposematic and mimetic signals on spider predators, and cases when spiders do not receive but send such signals. Attachments of the thesis include four original manuscripts. In the first study, we presented jumping spiders (Evarcha arcuata, Salticidae) with different colour forms (red-and-black, yellow-and-black, white-and-black) of the firebug (Pyrrhocoris apterus, Pyrrhocoridae). Our goal was to compare reactions of the spiders to various intensity of aposematic signalization, expecting red-and-black coloration to have the strongest effect. Aversive learning of all colour forms was equally effective, but generalization of the learned avoidance to other colour forms was more effective after switch from less (white-and-black, yellow-and-black) to more (red-and-black) conspicuously coloured prey. When tested the next day, avoidance of the white-and-black prey got mostly forgotten. In the second study, we assessed little studied sensitivity of spiders to smells of unpalatable prey. After jumping spiders learned to avoid firebugs, most of them avoided the firebug smell, showing their sensitivity not only to optical, but also to chemical part of signalization of the unpalatable prey. In the...
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Karyotype evolution of the family Araneidae
Pajpach, Filip ; Král, Jiří (advisor) ; Sember, Alexandr (referee)
Orb-weavers (Araneidae) are a diversified spider family comprising more than 3,100 species in more than 170 genera. Together with 13 other families, they con- stitute to superfamily Araneoidea. The presented thesis focuses on karyotype evo- lution of Araneidae, including its comparison with a related family Tetragnathidae. The results obtained from 19 araneid and four tetragnathid species confirm previ- ously postulated hypothesis that the ancestral karyotype of Araneoidea (including Araneidae) consists of 24 acrocentric chromosomes in males, including two acro- centric X chromosomes of system X1X20. However, there is a tendency of 2n decrease in some araneids due to centric fusions. In these cases, centric fusions affected most autosomes (and sometimes gonosomes as well); number of chromosome pairs de- creased from 11 to six. Three independent reduction events were detected in this thesis. Furthermore, pattern of nucleolar organizer regions (NORs) was studied in this thesis using fluorescent in situ hybridization, since data on evolution of this marker are scarce in spiders. Striking variability in NORs number was discovered, ranging from one to 13 loci. Remarkably, multiple centric fusions were always ac- companied by considerable increase of NORs number. In araneids and tetragnathids possessing...
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