An 100-million-year-old amber fossil showing the exact moment that a spider begins to attack a wasp has just been discovered by researchers. The scene is perfectly preserved in time, giving a remarkably detailed look into the distant past. This is the only fossil showing a spider attacking prey caught in its web ever found.

It’s an unprecedented fossil, that shows “an action that took place in the Hukawng Valley of Myanmar in the Early Cretaceous between 97-110 million years ago, almost certainly with dinosaurs wandering nearby.”

“Aside from showing the first and only fossil evidence of a spider attacking prey in its web, the piece of amber also contains the body of a male spider in the same web. This provides the oldest evidence of social behavior in spiders, which still exists in some species but is fairly rare. Most spiders have solitary, often cannibalistic lives, and males will not hesitate to attack immature species in the same web.”

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