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The Spider Club News The Spider Club News Editor: Joan Faiola DECEMBER 2011 - Vol.27 #4 Season’s Greetings to all our members Spider Club News December 2011 P a g e 1 Contents Page No. Who are we? 3 Mission Statement 3 Contact Details 3 From the Hub Chairman’s letter 4 From the Editor 5 Books Review: Alien & Invasive Animals 6 How to catalogue Books Part 2 7 News News from Butterfly World 7 Events Reports Yebo Gogga Wits 2011 8 Night Walk at Walter Sisulu 9 Interesting Sightings Sheetweb Mygalomorph E Cape 10 Two Scorpions? 11 New Arachnid for Astri (Schizomid) 11 Travelling Back-Flip Spider 13 ARACHNID SCIENCE Nephilids use chemicals to deter ants 15 World’s smallest Amber fossil 16 Tarantula Sticky Feet 17 New Research on GMO and spiders 18 New Cave Dwelling Pseudoscorpion 19 Photo Gallery Steve Rubin - Zululand 20 Spider Club diary 23 2011/2012 WE RESERVE COPYRIGHT ON OUR OWN MATERIAL. PLEASE CONTACT US AT [email protected] for permission to use any of this content. DISCLAIMER THE VIEWS OF THE CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS PUBLICATION DO NOT NECESSARILY COINCIDE WITH THOSE OF THE SPIDER CLUB OF SOUTHERN AFRICA. Spider Club News December 2011 P a g e 2 Who are we? The Spider Club of Southern Africa is a non-profit-making organisation. Our aim is to encourage an interest in arachnids – especially spiders and scorpions - and to promote this interest and the study of these animals by all suitable means. Membership is open to anyone – people interested in joining the club may apply to any committee member for information. Field outings, day visits, arachnid surveys and demonstrations, workshops and exhibits are arranged from time to time. A diary of events and outings is published at the end of this newsletter. Mission Statement “The Spider Club provides a fun, responsible, social learning experience, centred on spiders, their relatives and on nature in general.” Contact Us WEBSITE: http://www.spiderclub.co.za EMAIL ADDRESS: [email protected] Visit our website, and send us photos and news that we can post there! …. At the Spider Club of Southern Africa page Committee Treasurer Jaco Le Roux 083 258 8969 [email protected] Editor Joan Faiola 082 565 6025 [email protected] Chairman Astri Leroy 073 168 7187 [email protected] Charlotte Livingstone 083 439 6614 [email protected] Paul Cowan 082 773 5724 [email protected] Christy Mathie [email protected] Webmaster: Irmi Le Roux [email protected] Spider Club News December 2011 P a g e 3 ` A Christmas wish and a word of encouragement ………………….. Since the AGM in June and the new Spider Club year we seem to have lost quite a number of members – those who have not renewed their membership, which is a shame. When we sent out reminders there were only a few responses. I have asked this before, but I ask again: Can any of you think of good ways of recruiting new members? We really need to encourage a new batch of arachnophiles to join the club! As the chairman of the Spider Club of Southern Africa, it is my unpleasant duty to tell you that if you snooze you lose. Joan had arranged for a field trip to Sandfields and Forests and only two non-committee members volunteered to attend. The event was cancelled. It is very frustrating for the committee to arrange these events and have such a poor response. In September I asked what you had gained from being a member of the Spider Club, what you like about it or don’t like and I asked for feedback. No-one responded, but maybe now you have had more time to think about it. We would like to include an article on our members’ reactions to the spider club in our next newsletter. Summer is here and when the rains start in earnest (they’ve been a bit meagre so far in this neck of the woods) there will be plenty to see out there. If you are off to some wonderful place for the Christmas break, check out the spiders; send us photos and stories about what you see. We have some great trips and events coming up so please diarize them and join in. Make it your New Year’s resolution to attend AT LEAST two Spider Club events and again I plead with you: Don’t be an armchair arachnologist!! Have a lovely holiday, all the best for 2012 and come back refreshed and raring to go. Astri Leroy Spider Club News December 2011 P a g e 4 From the Editor: There is a lot of interesting stuff in this edition – much of it contributed by Astri Leroy. We don’t want the newsletter to just come from the two of us, so I urge you to send me material of interest. We would really appreciate contributions from the professional scientists among you as your contributions are highly valued and need to be shared with the rest of us. In addition we need more contributions (in the form of articles and photographs) from you amateur arachnophiles as these are often really interesting – as you will see from the contributions by members of the public in this edition of the newsletter. I am particularly grateful to Ankie Malan for sharing her photos and story of the Back-flip spider that made its way to Pretoria from Namaqualand. Also, some of my “friends” on Facebook have given me permission to publish their photos of spiders they have encountered. Our photo gallery this month is of photos by Steve Rubin of Zululand, who originally contacted us via the website. It thus becomes obvious that we get great contributions via Facebook and our website, and I am very grateful to all who have given me permission to publish their material. So, if you have read a book on arachnids, or found an article in a newspaper or on the web, or had an interesting arachnid experience, you can write a review or forward your finds or story to me. I am looking forward to receiving your contributions in the future. The latest SANSA newsletter (No. 15) is available for download at the following link: http://www.arc.agric.za/home.asp?pid=3291 There’s lots of interesting news, including a new family for South Africa, so go and have a look! Yours in spidering Joan Spider Club News December 2011 P a g e 5 Books BOOK REVIEW – BY Astri Leroy Alien and Invasive Animals, a South African Perspective Published By Struik, 2011. Soft cover, 240 pages. Colour illustrations throughout. Edited by Mike Picker, Associate Professor in Zoology, and Charles Griffiths, Professor (and former Head) of the Zoology Department, both of the University of Cape Town. Chapters by 19 authorities in their own fields. This book covers an immense field of invasive animals in the widest sense, both exotic (alien) and indigenous. Yes, indigenous species can be invasive and not all aliens are bad! You will have to read the book to check that comment. To quote the back cover: “Alien and invasive species represent the second- most important human impact on ecological systems, exceeded only by habitat destruction.” The blurb goes on to note that invasive plants have been well studied and reported on but animals have not. There are chapters on mammals, birds, reptiles, fresh water and marine fish, other marine organisms, chapters on different families of insects, other invertebrates - both marine and terrestrial - and of course our area of interest, arachnids. The one that blew me away was “our” Brown Button Spider, Latrodectus geometricus. I was convinced it was a local yokel, but apparently not. It is thought to have invaded North America via Australia and South Africa but it is native to South America. How about that? The other spiders mentioned are the Long-fanged Six-eyed spider Dysdera crocata, Humped Back Daddy-longlegs spider Crossopriza lyoni (I collected a few specimens in Houghton) and one of the Spitting spiders Scytodes thoracica. Interestingly the very common Feather Legged spider Uloborus plumipes isn’t mentioned. They are certainly invasive and exhibit all the trade-marks of aliens being common and widespread, commensal with humans and seem to displace local species. Probably the omission is because no studies have been carried out and there is no published data to refer to. You will probably be as amazed as I was to find that the little Drain or Moth Fly Clogmia albipunctata which can be seen in almost every bathroom in the country originated in Cuba and is now found throughout the tropical and subtropical world, that the Common Greenbottle (fly) is a European, the Human Flea originated in tropical South America and is thought to have arrived here via Europe and a whole lot of what I thought were “our” Woodlice are of European origin. That’s just the invertebrates. Did you know that along with the obvious rats, house mice, rabbits and grey squirrels, feral domestic cats and feral pigs are rated as amongst the 100 worst invasive species by the I.U.C.N.? This book is useful, fascinating and well worth adding to your collection. Oh yes and if anyone interested in invertebrates doesn’t know the two editors after their collaboration to publish the immensely popular and useful “Field Guide to Insects of South Africa”, they should! If you haven’t already acquired a copy of the insect field guide, go out and get one NOW or ask for one or both these books for Christmas.
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