A new and rare giant spider has been found hiding beneath a trapdoor made of silk and soil west of Brisbane, Australia.
The giant trapdoor spider, Euoplos dignitas, was discovered by researchers involved in Queensland Museum’s Project DIG, which has been running for the past four years to understand more about the state’s biodiversity.
LARGE FOR ITS KIND
What excites lead researcher Michael Rix most about the discovery of the new creepy crawly, found in the black soil around Queensland’s Eidsvold and Monto, is its size.
The females, which can live for more than 20 years in the wild, are larger than the males.
“It’s very big for a trapdoor spider,” said Rix, who is also Queensland Museum’s principal scientist and curator of arachnology.
“The females of this species can get up to five centimeters in body length,” he said.
The new species, the discovery of which was published in the Journal of Arachnology, plays an important role in the leaf litter ecosystem, helping to control insect populations.
AT RISK
However, the researchers found the species is likely threatened due to its small natural range and the amount of woodland that has been cleared in the region, Rix said.
“We think they’re probably in a bit of trouble ... but more work needs to be done to get a better handle of how much,” he said.
The female spiders spend their lives underground, while the males — which are honey red in color — leave the burrow after five to seven years to find a mate in another burrow, Rix said.
During the day, the trapdoor the spiders live beneath is closed, but at night, the spider sits just under the ajar door, waiting to grab insects as they scurry by.
‘NOT DANGEROUS’
The spiders use venom to subdue their prey, but they are not dangerous to humans, Rix said.
“The bite might be physically painful because of their size, but they’re not dangerous,” he said.
Rix said the next steps for the researchers will be determining where other populations of the spider exist in central Queensland.
“It is a really important process in both understanding what’s out there, but also as a step towards conservation,” he said.
Pins hidden in her shoes, head forced down a toilet, kicked in the stomach: South Korean hairdresser Pyo Ye-rim suffered a litany of abuse from school bullies, but now she is speaking out. The 26-year-old is part of a phenomenon sweeping South Korea known as “Hakpok #MeToo,” where people who were bullied publicly name and shame the perpetrators of school violence — “hakpok” in Korean — decades after the alleged crimes. Made famous globally by Netflix’s gory revenge series The Glory, the movement has ensnared everyone from K-pop stars to baseball players and accusations — often anonymous — can be career-ending, with
One of Australia’s two active volcanoes on an island near Antarctica — known as Big Ben — has been spotted by satellite spewing lava. The lava flow on the uninhabited Heard Island, about 4,100km southwest of Perth and 1,500km north of Antarctica, is part of an ongoing eruption that was first noted more than a decade ago. The image was caught by the European Space Agency’s Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellite on Thursday, and is a composite of an optical picture and an infrared image. The lava is seen flowing down the side of Big Ben from near the summit, known as Mawson Peak.
SYMBOLIC: The bill sponsored by a cross-party group of lawmakers was hailed as a ‘historic moment’ in the fight for marriage equality, but is unlikely to pass Lawmakers in South Korea have proposed the country’s first same-sex marriage bill, in a move hailed by civic groups as a defining moment in the fight for equality. The marriage equality bill, proposed by South Korean lawmaker Jang Hye-yeong of the minor opposition Justice Party and co-sponsored by 12 lawmakers across all the main parties, seeks to amend the country’s civil code to allow same-sex marriage. The bill is unlikely to pass, but forms part of a trio of bills expected to increase pressure on the government to expand the idea of family beyond traditional criteria. The two other bills relate to
TIME TO TALK: Among China’s grievances were economic and trade issues related to Taiwan, but both countries emphasized the need to maintain communication US Trade Representative Katherine Tai (戴琪) on Friday raised complaints about China’s state-led economic policies during a meeting with Chinese Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao (王文濤), who objected to US tariffs and trade policies, as well as issues related to Taiwan, their offices said. However, statements from the US Trade Representative’s (USTR) office and the Chinese Ministry of Commerce emphasized the need for Washington and Beijing to maintain communication on trade. “Ambassador Tai highlighted the need to address the critical imbalances caused by China’s state-led, non-market approach to the economy and trade policy,” the USTR said in a statement released after the
RSS