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Flatmesh and Longspinneret Spiders Superfamily: Eresoidea
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A quite varied group of spiders, of 415 species, as of November 2023, in 31 genera from three families. There is however, still some debate over the monophyly of this superfamily. Dunlop and Penney (2011) argued that all three do belong together whereas Wheeler et al (2017) have indicated that the Family: Eresidae is not to be placed with Hersiliidae and Oecobiidae in the one clade.
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To date this issue is still unresolved and iNaturalist still retains all three families in the Eresoidea. In Australia, the Eresidae * are not on the list of resident species so the issue does not really affect us. An undetermined number of species from three genera in two families can be found nationwide but only a handful are considered local to the Northern Rivers.
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The Eresoid Spiders prefer a temperate to tropical climate. Generally they are medium to large spiders and whereas the Eresidae contain a number of colourful species, the other two families consist mainly of spiders that are coloured and patterned so as to blend in with their surroundings. Both the Hersillidae and the Oecobiidae use their silk in rather unusual ways. More on that on their respective pages.
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* Unfortunately, because the Eresidae are indeed quite interesting. Some species are social animals with very elaborate behavioural systems in place. They also display unique maternal behaviours that result in the mother spiders gradually feeding themselves to their offspring.
References and links:
> Dunlop, J.A. and Penney, D., (2011). 'Order Araneae Clerck, 1757.' in: Zhang, Z.-Q. (ed.), Animal biodiversity: An outline of higher level classification and survey of taxonomic richness.' Zootaxa, Magnolia Press, Auckland, New Zealand. ISBN 978-1-86977-850-7
> Garrison, N.L., Rodriguez, J., Agnarsson, I., Coddington, J.A., Griswold, C.E., Hamilton, C.A., Hedin, M., Kocot, K.M., Ledford, J.M. and Bond, J.E., (2016). 'Spider phylogenomics: untangling the Spider Tree of Life.' PeerJ. 2016 Feb 23;4:e1719. doi: 10.7717/peerj.1719.
> Seibt, U. and Wickler, W., (1988). 'Interspecific tolerance in social Stegodyphus spiders (Eresidae, Araneae).' J. Arachnol.. 16.
> Wheeler, W.C. et al, (2017). 'The spider tree of life: phylogeny of Araneae based on target-gene analyses from an extensive taxon sampling.' Cladistics. 33 (6): 609. doi:10.1111/cla.12182. S2CID 35535038
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Velvet_spider
> Dunlop, J.A. and Penney, D., (2011). 'Order Araneae Clerck, 1757.' in: Zhang, Z.-Q. (ed.), Animal biodiversity: An outline of higher level classification and survey of taxonomic richness.' Zootaxa, Magnolia Press, Auckland, New Zealand. ISBN 978-1-86977-850-7
> Garrison, N.L., Rodriguez, J., Agnarsson, I., Coddington, J.A., Griswold, C.E., Hamilton, C.A., Hedin, M., Kocot, K.M., Ledford, J.M. and Bond, J.E., (2016). 'Spider phylogenomics: untangling the Spider Tree of Life.' PeerJ. 2016 Feb 23;4:e1719. doi: 10.7717/peerj.1719.
> Seibt, U. and Wickler, W., (1988). 'Interspecific tolerance in social Stegodyphus spiders (Eresidae, Araneae).' J. Arachnol.. 16.
> Wheeler, W.C. et al, (2017). 'The spider tree of life: phylogeny of Araneae based on target-gene analyses from an extensive taxon sampling.' Cladistics. 33 (6): 609. doi:10.1111/cla.12182. S2CID 35535038
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Velvet_spider
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