Tag: PHOLCIDAE

Daddy-Long-Leg or cellar spider. The most commonly found and encountered spider in South Africa, often making themselves right at home indoors, in corners and rafts in the ceiling area or under sinks. For the longest time, there had been a misconception on their venom, claiming that if their fangs weren’t so small, they’d be a threat to humans. This has been proven false. They are medically insignificant to humans.

QUAMTANA LOTZI

QUAMTANA LOTZI

by anikekirsten
Adult female Q. lotzi

Taxon:

  • Class: Arachnida
  • Order: Araneae
  • Infra-Order: Araneamorph (true spiders)
  • Family: Pholcidae
  • Genus: Quamtana
  • Species: Q. lotzi

Female

Around 1mm in body length. Leg span of approximately 15mm diagonally.

Cephalothorax:
Carapace yellowish with darkened fovea. Ocular region raised, 2 eye groupings of 3 eyes each anterior centre with large space between. Dark patch on clypeus under each eye group. Sternum shield shape, plain, yellowish. Mouth region black. Chelicera black. Pedipalps small, yellowish.

Abdomen:
Abdomen round, greyish brown, with yellowish orange spots, ventral plain. Spinnerets taper to point far beneath, middle of profile, pointing straight down.

Legs:
Yellow, plain, thin and long. 1, 4, 2, 3.

Male

Unknown.

Adult female Q. lotzi

ABOUT THE GENUS

These tiny spiders are commonly known as spotted cellar / daddy-long-legs spiders and they are indigenous to Africa with 26 described species, most from South Africa. They average 1mm in body length with variations on abdominal markings and shape. Some species have eight eyes while others have six. Q. lotzi is one of those with only six eyes in two groupings. They live in or around shrubs and bushes and sometimes in leaf litter and under rocks as often seen in the semi-desert environment of Orania.

SMERINGOPUS NATALENSIS

SMERINGOPUS NATALENSIS

by anikekirsten
Adult female S. nataensis

Taxon:

  • Class: Arachnida
  • Order: Araneae
  • Infra-Order: Araneamorph (true spiders)
  • Family: Pholcidae
  • Genus: Smeringopus
  • Species: S. natalensis

Female

Around 10mm in body length. Leg span of approximately 100mm diagonally.

Cephalothorax:
Round and flat yellowish brown carapace with dark almost-hourglass marking down centre and 3 dark triangles around edges on each side. Sternum and labium dark brown and coxae light yellowish. Pedipalps light brown and very short.

Abdomen:
Long and thin. Dorsal light brown with yellow tint, dark heart-marking down centre, 5 thick dark lines down each side of heart-marking, and three dark patches posterior centre. Ventral yellowish with thick dark line down middle and small dark spots. Epigastric furrow large and dark.

Legs:
Long and thin, light brown with black and white bands around end of femur, patella, and end of tibia. Leg formation 1, 4, 2, 3.

Male

As in female but with slightly shorter legs and tarsus of pedipalps reddish and bulbous.

Adult female S. nataensis with egg sac
Adult female S. nataensis

ABOUT THE GENUS

The genus Smeringopus is easy to identify by eye, due to the pretty and unique patterns on the dorsal side of its long and thin abdomen. Along with that are the black and white bands around the joints of the legs.

Like many Pholcids, this genus quickly dominates an area, building its web and displacing any other invertebrate around it. They, too, carry their eggs in a clutch between their chelicera and pedipalps until the young hatch and disperse.

Smeringopus is also a richly diverse genus, currently with 55 known and described species! There could even be more yet undescribed. These are large spiders, in leg length that is. Their bodies are small relative to their legs, but are still considered a medium to large size for true spiders.

Smeringopus, along with the Giant Cellar spider Artema atlanta, are sometimes mistaken for Violin spiders (also known as Recluse spiders) in South Africa, because of the general shape of their body and legs and the pattern on their carapace.