>This is better than collecting webs in the wild, or on the back porch,
>because they will be clean. The webs I have collected were often dusty
>and it took some looking to get a clean piece.
What the heck, one more comment on collecting silk. Most spiders make two kinds. The big orb (even sounds like it should have an astronomical purpose) webs have radial threads that are very strong and these are the ones you should collect. Often they extend from beams and walls for a distance before reaching the web proper and with a little effort you can collect a long piece. The other kind of silk is the one that spirals from inside to outside. This silk is sticky, for obvious reasons, and it gets dusty and isn't as strong as the radials. If you watch a spider working you'll see that it walks only on the radials so it won't get stuck in its own web. I guess a captive spider would produce the stronger silk to hang from when trying to escape. There is lots more to say about this but this is the practical stuff for our purposes here.
Aart M. Olsen aart@uiuc.edu 217-333-7467 College of Veterinary Medicine Univ of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign