A NEW spider species has been identified in Mauritius thanks to the work of Durrell.
The spider was first spotted in 2023 on Ilot Vacoas, a tiny one-hectare island off the south-east coast of Mauritius, during conservation work carried out as part of the Mauritius Island Restoration Programme.
After work to identify it, the Mauritian Tidal Trapdoor Spider has been formally identified as a species completely new to science.
The spider lives in the intertidal zone, meaning that its habitat is completely submerged at high tide. It inhabits existing tubes in the bedrock and seals its entrance with a camouflaged trapdoor made of silk, sand and algae.
The Mauritius Island Restoration Programme is a partnership involving Jersey’s Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, the Mauritian Wildlife Foundation and the National Parks and Conservation Service, alongside support from the Forestry Service.
Nik Cole, Mauritius country manager at Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, who was part of the team which made the discovery, recalled being shocked that a spider which is part of the same group as tarantulas was living in such an environment.
“The thing I remember most is Max screaming at me to come over because he’d just seen a mygalomorph – a trapdoor spider,” he said.
“I was up all night, holding my phone in the air trying to get a signal and searching for any evidence of a spider like this in Mauritius. At first we thought we might have found Tigidia mauriciana, which was first described in 1892 and had only ever been detected once.
“To discover this was actually a new species, after decades of night-time reptile surveys on these islands, was incredibly exciting.”
Experts from the Mauritian government, Mauritian Wildlife Foundation, Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, Natural History Museum London, Cardiff University and Wildlife Preservation Canada were brought together to undertake this research.
Arachnologist Danniella Sherwood, who led the scientific study formally describing the new species, said: “It was a great honour and privilege to work with colleagues from Mauritius and in the UK on this material, benefitting from the insights of so many diverse colleagues and organisations.
“This paper is an amazing example of what modern scientific collaboration should look like. The fact that one of the newly recorded species was also new to science was the icing on the cake.”
The wider research also identified a number of spider species which were not previously recorded in Mauritius, increasing the known spider diversity of the country by more than 25%
