Description
During the Fall in Joshua Tree male tarantulas (Aphonopelma iodium) migrate across the desert in search of a mate, guided by pheromonal trails towards the female’s excavated, silk-lined burrow. The spiders dance before copulation, after which the female kills the male and eats the body, providing nutrients for 500-1000 eggs and the work of building a silk cocoon in which to house them. The tarantula’s major predator is the tarantula hawk, a large iridescent blue and orange wasp which paralyzes the spider, drags it to its nest, lays eggs in its abdomen, and walls it in. Once hatched, the hawk’s larvae feed on the still-living tarantula, carefully eating around its vital organs until they are ready to fledge.
What could architecture learn from the tarantula? In this course, the life of this local species provides an allegory for how building resources can be distributed within a fragile ecosystem to sustain collective life in ways that challenge received thinking about (self-)preservati