Sometimes the spider would immediately catch the prey and eat it; at
other times the fly would buzz around in the bottle for days till the
spider was ready to eat it.
Dr Vijayalakshmi also bred a particular species of fly in a small cage
with fine mesh with a small saucer of milk in the centre as a medium
for breeding.
Baby spiders were also housed individually in bottles and these were
fed fly larvae or the larvae which come when maida or rava begins to
lose its freshness.
The purpose of all these experiments was to find out which types of
spiders were useful for using as pest control agents to deal with
cockroaches. Information about spiders such as their growth, hardiness,
their eating habits, reproduction etc. are important indicators of the
species of spiders that can be kept in houses as predators for
cockroaches.
Other than the spider work I tried to learn Tamil from Selvan but he
was keen to learn English from me and so both of us failed in learning
a new language and ended up speaking a cocktail of TamEnglish instead.
Extracts from Diary:
Spiders
26th November: Uncle Mano and I left for Dr Vijayalakshmi's office this
morning at 7 a.m. While Uncle Mano and Madam chatted, I read some
books. Madam then showed us her spider collection. She also introduced
me to Selvan.
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