There have been some postings on this subject on the archaeological
discussion site Britarch.
Has the Lnhs any ideas?

Peter Pickering (conscious he will have to wait for the Moderator's return)

MESSAGE 1
I saw a message about 'ticking spiders' in the britarchive (forgive me, I
didn't make a note of who had posted it). I don't know why they do it, but
I did (as a small child of about 5) experience this. I was stood outside
the door of my home at that time, and we had a wooden shed / garage
immediately the other side of a small path, and beyond this, and the edge
of our property, was some now long-built-over market garden, where an old
chap grew strawberries. I had noticed the 'ticking' and idly wondered what
it was, but Ernie took me and showed me the culprit. There was a spider, in
a thick web spun under the eave of the garage, who was swinging wildly
backwards and forwards, and the ticking was the sound of it hitting the
woodwork over and over again. The spider was obviously doing it
deliberately, because there was very little breeze and it continued until I
lost interest. It must have made an impression on me for me to remember it
all this time.

MESSAGE 2

There's 'deliberate' and 'deliberate'. From more than one observation,
it seems to me that they do this when departure to the Great Web in the
Sky is no far off. I assume that something dire happens to the nervous
system and this spasmodic movement is the result.

MESSAGE 3

According to an ex-government entomologist friends of mine (Richard
Chambers)

Some spiders vibrate rapidly in their web apparently as a means of confusing
a possible predator - presenting a blurred image presumably. They do this
if they
sense you are near. I hadn't heard of a spider doing this 'deliberately' to
make a
ticking noise.




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