Thirty New Spider Species Found in China
Posted on December 4, 2014
Thirty new species of spiders of have been discovered in China. The spiders were discovered by scientists from the Institute of Zoology with the Chinese Academy of Sciences. They were found in the Xishuangbanna tropical rain forest. Neriene circifolia, one of the newly discovered species, is pictured above.
The Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden (XTBG) is a biological hot spot located in the rain forest. The photo below illustrates the uniqueness of the region where the new spiders were found. It is home to over 10 thousand species of tropical and subtropical plants. The researchers suspect that the newly discovered species represent a small number of the number of new species that remain unidentified in the XTBG. Prof. Li and his team already have information on another 100 spider species from the region they will publish soon. Many more spiders remain unknown in the rainforest.
Prof. Li says in a statement, "The amazing biological diversity we have witnessed during our work on spiders in Huladao is perhaps only a part of what Xishuangbanna tropical rain forests hold. Studying the flora and fauna in biodiversity hotspots like these attests for the importance of their preservations, and gives a sad insight of what was lost with the destruction of forests elsewhere."
A research paper on the newly discovered linyphiid spiders can be found here in ZooKeys.
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