prey of E. culicivora, but E. culicivora disregards their presence as well as the majority of all other insects present. E. culicivora builds nests, where it primarily resides. Nests are built within closed spaces such as tree trunks or walls of buildings and are often made of dead foliage such as leaves. It hides in the grass or other plants close to the ground when it is quiescent. When it is hunting, it will go to more exposed locations such as the walls inside some mosquito-infested houses. Home range and territoriality Nest structure Around E. culicivora common habitats, such as tree trunks or walls of buildings, individuals build nests on dead leafs inside their webs. Their webs are silk tubes. The length of an individual's web equates to four-times the resident spider's body length, while the width of the web is six-times the resident spider's body width. Typically, there are one or more elastic openings. The nests are built from dead, rolled-up leaves and some grass, which form an enclosed space in the spider webs. Nests located at the narrow end of the conical leaf typically contain only one door, opening at the wider end. For nests that have more space, there are two openings. It is rare to have three openings in a nest. Interactions at the nest In female-female and male-male interactions, the intruder encroaches when the resident is quiescent in the nest. The intruder usually probes first and then pushes its face into the silk, chewing and tugging the silk. The resident pulls on the silk as a response. For male-female interaction at the nest, see the mating section. Observations have been made of males cohabiting with females. In cases of cohabitation, the two silk tubes are woven together and the two doors of the two chambers are aligned together. See the Courtship section for more information on how cohabitation plays a role in courtship. Diet Predatory feeding Spiders do not normally feed directly on vertebrate blood. E. culicivora feeds indirectly on vertebrate blood by preying on female mosquitoes that have had recent blood meals. E. culicivora chooses blood fed females over non-mosquito prey, male mosquitoes and sugar-fed female mosquitoes, which demonstrates their preference of blood. As of 2015, E. culicivora is one of only two spiders that have been experimentally studied and considered a mosquito specialist, the other being Paracyrba wanlessi. The term mosquito specialization refers