JoTT COMMUNI C ATION 4(14): 3233–3254 Western Ghats Special Series A new genus of the family Theraphosidae (Araneae: Mygalomorphae) with description of three new species from the Western Ghats of Karnataka, India Manju Siliwal 1, Neha Gupta 2 & Robert Raven 3 1 Wildlife Information Liaison Development Society, 96 Kumudham Nagar, Vilankuruchi Road, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu 641035, India 2 University School of Environmental Management, Guru Gobind Indraprastha University, Sector 16-C, Dwarka, New Delhi 110075, India 3 Queensland Museum, Grey Street, PO Box 3300, South Brisbane, 4101, Queensland, Australia Email: 1
[email protected] (corresponding author), 2
[email protected], 3
[email protected] Date of publication (online): 26 November 2012 Abstract: In this paper, a new genus Neoheterophrictus gen. nov., with three new species, Date of publication (print): 26 November 2012 Neoheterophrictus crurofulvus sp. nov., N. sahyadri sp. nov. and N. uttarakannada sp. ISSN 0974-7907 (online) | 0974-7893 (print) nov., is described from Uttara Kannada District, Karnataka, India. The new genus is close to Heterophrictus Pocock, 1900 and Plesiophrictus Pocock, 1899 but has multilobed Editor: Anonymity requested spermathecae, which was consistent in all the three species and the males possessing Manuscript details: double tibial spur. Natural history information for all the species described is provided. Ms # o3065 We transfer Plesiophrictus bhori Gravely, 1915 to Heterophrictus and synonymise P. Received 20 January 2012 mahabaleshwari Tikader, 1977 with Heterophrictus milleti Pocock, 1900. Final received 09 July 2012 Finally accepted 08 November 2012 Keywords: Eumernophorinae, Heterophrictus, new genus, new species, Plesiophrictus, tarantula, taxonomy, Theraphosidae. Citation: Siliwal, M., N.