Beetle versus spider | A Gallery from Our Changing World | RNZ National

Redback spiders are living in rabbit holes in the Cromwell chafer beetle reserve and eating the threatened Cromwell chafer beetle.

Redback spider versus RNZ microphone

Redback spiders take up residence in empty rabbit burrows

Remains of beetles and other insects caught in a redback spider web outside a rabbit burrow

Jackie Spencer using long handled tongs to safely search a rabbit burrow for redback spiders

Large female redback spider

Darkling beetle - number 1 on redback spider menu

Cromwell chafer beetle remains in a redback spider web

Pericoptus frontalis - number 3 on redback spider menu

Redback spider egg sacs - each can contain up to 250 spiderlings

Redback spiders are venomous - the bite is excrutiatingly painful but not fatal

Cromwell chafer beetle reserve

Cromwell chafer beetle reserve information sign

The images in this gallery are used with permission and are subject to copyright conditions.