2007 Survey for the purseweb spiders Sphodros niger and Sphodros rufipes
| Main Authors: | Mckenna-Foster, Andrew, Comeau Beaton, Cheryl |
|---|---|
| Format: | Report Journal |
| Terbitan: |
, 2008
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: |
https://zenodo.org/record/3782785 |
Daftar Isi:
- Report submitted in fulfillment of a 2007 Nantucket Biodiversity Initiative grant In 2006 we caught two male purseweb spiders, Sphodros niger (Hentz), on Nantucket Island and we recorded dense populations of purseweb spider tubes belonging to what we have identified as Sphodros rufipes (Latreille) on Tuckernuck Island. S. niger is hard to find and understudied and S. rufipes is at its most extreme northern range on Tuckernuck. With support from the Nantucket Biodiversity Initiative, the Maria Mitchell Association, and the Tuckernuck Land Trust, we spent part of the summer in 2007 trapping for extremely cryptic S. niger on Nantucket in hopes of finding an area where we could uncover their tube webs. In addition to 336 pitfall trap-nights in three locations, we also completed five hours of searching in likely habitat for the tubes. We did not find any tubes but we did trap three more male specimens from two new locations and recorded an approximate wandering week in 2007 for the males of 6-14 June. We also accumulated 11 hours of search time in likely habitat looking for tubes of S. rufipes on Nantucket, without success. During a trip to Tuckernuck we repeated a 2006 survey of S. rufipes tubes and counted about 50 within 100 m2. This tube density is very rare for the species and leads us to wonder if some of the tubes are S. niger. Whether S. niger occurs on Tuckernuck and S. rufipes on Nantucket and why S. rufipes is abnormally abundant on Tuckernuck remains unknown but this report provides the information needed so that for future work can answer these questions efficiently.