Classification of arachnids. Significance in nature and human life of arachnids

The importance in nature and human life of arachnids is difficult to overestimate. After all, they are an important element in the food chain, regulate the number of many species of insects, and some can even be deadly. The importance of arachnids in nature and human life will be briefly outlined in our article.

Characteristic features of the structure of arachnids

But first let's understand, according to what signs animal organisms are referred to this systematic unit.

They are representatives of the arthropod type, whose body consists of the cephalothorax and abdomen. On the first of them are six pairs of limbs - it chelicera, with which arachnids pierce the body of the victim. There are also tentacles and four pairs of walking legs. Antennae are deprived of Antennae. There are no limbs on the abdomen, but they can be modified into spider warts or pulmonary sacs. The features of the structure determine what value in the nature of arachnids.

What is the web

The prevailing number of arachnids is able to build fishing nets from a special substance found in special warts. They produce threads that, by their strength, can be compared even with a steel wire. A web pattern is characteristic of each species. On spirally twisted strands there are drops of adhesive liquid. If an insect gets into it, then the chances of getting out of it a little. In addition to the network's hunters, dwellings and cocoons are made of this substance. The importance of the arachnids in nature and life is also determined by the way they feed.

Spiders-predators

All kinds of spiders are predators, but the ways of hunting are completely different for them. To receive a sacrifice, it is not necessary to lie in wait and attack it, like spiders-horses. Many species use a network for this purpose. Once in it, the insect tries to escape. In this case, the threads of the web begin to oscillate. One of them is always attached to the predator's limb. He only remains to approach the victim and kill her.

The importance of arachnids in nature and human life is conditioned by the way of digestion. They can only eat liquid food. Through the hole that the spider does in the body of the victim with the help of chelicer, it injects digestive enzymes inside. After a certain period of time, the spider injects into its intestine already digested contents with the help of its own suckling stomach.

For a person can be dangerous bites of karakurt and tarantula. Their poison causes severe pain all over the body, trembling and loss of consciousness. In this state, a person needs to introduce a special serum, and place a bite place with a match to stop the spread of toxins.

The importance of arachnids in nature and human life

It is worth noting that predatory spiders never attack a person in order to profit. They do it for protection. But their poison can be deadly. However, most often spiders prey on small inhabitants of reservoirs and insects. Destroying the latter, they thereby regulate their numbers. Thus, the number of bloodsucking insects, pests of agriculture decreases. This, of course, determines the positive value in nature and human life of arachnids. Spider venom is the raw material for the production of hypnotic and sedative drugs. To produce them, many species of spiders are bred artificially.

Ticks: the importance of arachnids in life

Modern taxonomy divides the arachnids into nine orders. The most common are spiders, mites and scorpions. The importance of arachnids in the life of people and nature has different systematic categories of this type of arthropod animal.

Everyone knows that walking through the forest belt in late spring and early summer can be dangerous. It is during this period that the mites actively multiply and look for sources of nutrition. Their body consists of fused cephalothorax and abdomen, and the head is formed by the senses and chelicerae. Ticks also differs from other arachnid indirect development cycle. This means that the larva develops from the egg with three pairs of legs, which eventually transform into four.

Habitat

Great importance in nature and human life of arachnids is due to their wide distribution. These are not only forest tracts, saline and fresh water bodies, soil, various plants, surface, but also the body of animals and humans - all these environments are perfectly suitable for nutrition and life activity of ticks.

The negative value of arachnids in the life of people and nature is that many species of ticks are the causative agents of very dangerous diseases. Feeding on the blood of humans and animals, they can tolerate encephalitis, pyroplasmosis of cattle and dogs, recurrent typhus.

Severe itching on the skin and the appearance of scabs (scabs) may be a manifestation of parsitism of itchy itch. This tick gnaws through the skin, while laying its eggs there. From there, young, mature mites come out in time. It is not always possible to notice the cause immediately, because the size of the itchy itch oscillates within 0.2-0.5 mm. The danger lies also in the fact that a person can get infected by the household way: when using one towel, comb, with a handshake.

In the sebaceous glands and hair bags of the human body, an acorn stamina can parasitize . This parasite causes the appearance of pustules on the skin, hair loss.

Barn and claw mites are harmful to agriculture and food stocks. Ambarnye species on man do not parasitize. These pincers live in mattresses, pillows, blankets, bed linens, cracks in the sexes, feed on dead organic matter. But the products of their vital activity, the covers that remain after the moult, often fall into the human respiratory tract, causing severe allergic reactions.

Ways of protection

To protect yourself from ticks, going for a walk, you need to close the body with tight clothing and a headdress. Returning home, view all the items, remove and destroy the dangerous arachnids.

If the parasite has already sucked in, act carefully. Vegetable oil or petroleum jelly needs to be treated with the attachment site of the tick. The essence of this action is that in the spiracles of their trachea located on the ventral side of the body, oxygen ceases to flow. As a result, the tick disappears by itself. If you try to tear it away by force, then the head of the parasite will remain under the skin. This can lead to rotting of the wound. And in this case it is impossible to do without surgical intervention. If you did everything right, do not throw away the tick. It is better to take it to a specialized laboratory in order to find out if it is a carrier of a dangerous disease.

In order not to give chances to develop a barn clamp, it is necessary to monitor hygiene in the house, periodically change bed linens, dry pillows and mattresses in the sun, and often carry out wet cleaning of the room.

Scorpions

Scorpions are also bright representatives of the arachnids. Most of them live in tropical regions and in the subtropical regions. On the back of their abdomen are glands containing a poisonous substance. The ducts of the toxic glands are opened with a needle, which ends the abdomen. Scorpion venom is very dangerous for health, and sometimes for human life.

Benefit and harm

But, as they say, there is no thin without good. An important positive value of arachnids in nature and human life is their participation in the processes of soil formation. For example, armor pliers, being saprotrophs, decompose the dead organic matter. At the same time, the soil is enriched with nitrogen, which is so necessary for plants to develop the root system. Destroying harmful insects and other arthropods, many species of mites contribute to the salvage of crops of cultivated plants, hinder the processes of the spread of deadly diseases.

Thus, the importance of arachnids in nature, people's lives is great both negative and positive.