New Peacock Spiders Discovered:
On a trip trudging through the wet and cold of southern Western Australia last year, Jurgen Otto rediscovered a dancing spider dubbed the Hokey Pokey.
And in the process, he stumbled across a species never before classified.
Along with his colleague David Knowles, Dr Otto has discovered most of the 70 known species of peacock spider — and he loves them.
It's because, he says, they're more like dogs or cats, or people, than spiders.
"They're very charming animals. They've got these big eyes, and it's very easy to like them ... I've often compared them to puppies and kittens."
"They're curious, they get excited, they push themselves up on their legs to see better, they crouch down and hide.
"They're not like a grasshopper or something that just doesn't show any [emotion], they're more like us than other invertebrates."
[...] In a paper published this week in the journal Pekhamia [PDF-88.7MB], Dr Otto and his colleague David Hill officially gave a name to the Hokey Pokey: Maratus tortus, with "tortus" being Latin for "twisted".
[...] He's put together a website in his spare time with photos documenting each of the species.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by slap on Tuesday July 24 2018, @02:46AM
Spiders? Just no.
Snakes are fine, as long as they are not venomous. I'll pick up wild ratsnakes and move them out of the way to a safe location - no problem. Handling boas or pythons? Easy peasy. Spiders? No.