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The Spider Club News Editor: Joan Faiola MARCH 2013 - Vol.29 #1 The Big Bug Expo at the Walter Sisulu National Botanical Garden This expo of huge bugs displayed throughout the garden in various unexpected spots caused quite a stir. Imagine an enormous mantid leering at you from beneath a cycad or this spider dwarfing your two year old son! The expo was planned to run from November 2012 to January 2013 but if the garden can find a sponsor they would like to extend this awesome display for as long as possible. Members of the public were astonished to find these creatures blending with the garden’s landscape and it is one of those rare ventures that contribute to the garden’s efforts to raise awareness of the value of nature and biodiversity to all our lives. Spider Club News March 2013 PAGE 1 In this issue Page No. Who are we? 4 Mission Statement 4 Contact Details 4 From the Hub Chairman’s letter 5 From the Editor 5 Books An old Theodore Savory book 6 Events Reports Kokopelli Farm 8 Johannesburg Zoo Farm 9 Articles Butt-eyed spider Panaratella immaculata 11 Notes on Nilus spp in Southern Africa 12 Alarmist emails on Violin Spiders 14 Range extension of a Stasimopus species 16 Nephilidae revisited 18 Nephilidae gallery 21 Spider Club diary Diary 2013 23 THE SPIDER CLUB OF SOUTHERN AFRICA RESERVES COPYRIGHT ON ITS OWN MATERIAL. PLEASE CONTACT THE CLUB 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 March 2013 PAGE 2 Who are we? The Spider Club of Southern Africa is a non-profit 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] Astri Leroy 073 168 7187 [email protected] Charlotte Livingstone 083 439 6614 [email protected] Paul Cowan 082 773 5724 [email protected] Miemmie Byrch 082 772 3928 [email protected] Spider Club News March 2013 PAGE 3 From the Hub The “spider season” is drawing to an end. But don’t worry; we have good things up our sleeves for you. Please check the diary and our Facebook page and keep some dates free for things arachnological. On another tack, if you feel out of your depth with the names of spiders, scorpions, solifuges, whip spiders, false scorpions, etc., and feel you cannot identify more than a very few, the best way to learn is hands-on. That means join in club activities and learn in the field and/or at sorting and identification workshops. Of course if you don’t want to, not to worry, we will still send you a newsletter but if you want to get your money’s worth GET INVOLVED. If you can only get to one event a year, that is a huge bonus and we would really love to see you. In February Norman Larsen from Cape Town phoned to tell me that one of the original Spider Club members had died last September. Eloïse Seekings was very involved in the club in the 1980’s when she lived in Pretoria and before she and her family relocated to Bergvliet in Cape Town. She and her husband Geoff stayed in touch with the club for many years and when we visited Cape Town we often looked them up and even once or twice just bumped into them. Several years ago we unexpectedly met Eloïse’s identical twin sister Christine. These sisters looked so alike that I honestly thought it WAS Eloïse, started talking about spiders but it turns out that Christine is terrified of them and quickly explained who she was! Eloïse and I shared many interests but of course the big link was spiders. Sadly over the years and kilometres our friendship sort of slipped away, so I had no idea that she had died. The 1980’s is a long time ago – some of you weren’t even BORN and maybe there is no one else who remembers her ready grin, infectious chuckle and generous nature and that makes me feel very old indeed. Rest in peace Eloïse and I hope there are lots of spiders and other little things to interest you where you are now. This is a stark reminder of our mortality and an impetus to get out there and do things. Don’t wait for tomorrow, it may never come. Arachnologically yours. Astri Spider Club News March 2013 PAGE 4 From the Editor: A couple of years ago, Matjaž Kuntner and Jonathan Coddington described a new species of Nephila from museum specimens. Until recently we could only speculate on what colours this new species would sport, as specimens preserved in alcohol lose their colours over time. Then Ryan Tippett came across the spider some kilometres south of its known range, and we now know how beautiful Nephila komaci is when alive. Norman Larsen writes about this species, and the other Southern African members of the nephilid family, on page 18. Some wonderful photos illustrate his article. Meg Cumming saw red, and decided to refute once and for all the scare emails concerning violin spiders. She makes a wonderful case with her clear thinking and succinct prose, and we have already started using her words when confronted with a fearful public who are often misinformed, even by the doctors they turn to. We are always prepared to learn something new, and the Butt-eyed Spider showed what evolution can do in providing a species with a defensive strategy. It’s not just the Pearl-spotted Owlet or many different species of moths and butterflies that use eye spots – this spider does too, and even wiggles its bum and eye spots at potential threats. You can read all this and more in this issue. I hope that you enjoy it. Thanks to our wonderful contributors for their efforts. Yours in spidering Joan Spider Club News March 2013 PAGE 5 Books Review: Spiders By TH Savory ISBN O 602 21620 6. Published in 1971 by Ginn & Company Ltd. Drawings by Carole Taylor. Soft cover, 61 pages. Second-hand copies still available on line (I see we paid R1.99 for it in 1984!) I don’t have any new arachnid books to review so checked in my “spider library”, (extensive) to see which books I had never opened and this is the one I found. I KNOW I hadn’t opened it because I had to cut some of the pages apart to read it. Of course Theodore H Savory is one of the 20th Century’s big names in arachnology with many publications to his name. This “popular science” book is aimed at children but fascinated me. (Maybe I haven’t grown up!) It’s a book of simple experiments and plans for cages in which to keep different kinds of spiders. This interests me and I will use some of his suggestions to make suitable homes for the variety of spiders I keep for display and educational purposes. Carole’s line drawings of spiders and cages are clear, simple and easy to understand. The colour photos are old-fashioned and to us who are used to the magnificent illustrations in modern books really not great, but they are not very important in this context. The book is based on just a few British spiders and has 9 short chapters, “Meet the Spider” is an introduction, “House Spiders”, “How spiders behave”, “Wolf spiders”, “Pirate spiders”, “Crab spiders”, “Orb spiders”, “Harvest spiders” (of course not spiders but Opiliones) and “More spiders”. Each chapter outlines one or two species gives relevant ideas for experiments and asks what can be found out from these experiments. Good stuff for Yebo Gogga perhaps? He shows how to:- Breed flies Show that some spiders avoid light Determine if they prefer one colour over another Show that web spiders use vibrations in the web and not their eyesight to find prey and pirate spiders (like our fishing spiders) use water vibrations Determine how far wolf spiders can visually detect prey Induce male wolf spiders (and I guess jumping spiders too) to carry out their courtship displays and other similar and interesting experiments I feel pretty foolish not to have read this book before, now I will read it from cover to cover. Spider Club News March 2013 PAGE 6 The language is clear and understandable, the content fascinating and much of it very useful to anyone who wants to keep spiders (other than pet-shop tarantulas) without unduly stressing them and so that they will show their natural behaviour.
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