Laboratory studies show that Portia learns very quickly how to overcome web-building spiders that neither it nor its evolutionary ancestors would have met in the wild. Portia’s accurate visual recognition of potential prey is an important part of its hunting tactics. For example in one part of the Philippines local Portia spiders attack from the rear against the very dangerous spitting spiders, which themselves hunt jumping spiders. This appears to be an instinctive behavior, as laboratory-reared Portias of this species do this the first time they encounter a spitting spider. On the other hand they will use a head-on approach against spitting spiders that are carrying eggs. However, experiments that pitted Portias against "convincing" artificial spiders with arbitrary but consistent behavior patterns showed that Portia’s instinctive tactics are only starting points for a trial-and-error approach from which these spiders learn very quickly.[3] Nonetheless, they seem to be relatively slow "thinkers", as they solve tactical problems by using brains vastly smaller than mammalian predators'