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Schlagwort-Archiv: Arachnids Madagascar

Spider with lasso: Deinopis madagascariensis

Madagascar is home to many strange creatures. A particularly obscure one is the Malagasy Net-casting Spider (Deinopis madagascariensis). As the name suggests, one characteristic of this spider is special: the way it catches its food. The Net-Casting Spider lets itself be suspended from a leaf or branch by a thread. Then it stretches a kind of lasso made of spinning …

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Horror in the jungle: Megaloremmius leo

Megaloremmius leo

It will surely frighten you when you discover it for the first time: Megaloremmius leo, one of the few large spiders in Madagascar. Eight long legs, a thick, clumsy body, bright red hair on a black ground. Although it looks like a tarantula, it is not even related to them. Megaloremmius leo belongs to a family of spiders that are …

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No fear of tiny spines

Gasteracantha thorelli

Rainforests are their home: Tiny, colorful, spiny creatures in spider webs. These are spiny orb weavers, and they do not really fit into the concept of a scary, quickly moving eightlegged spider. Their unusually shaped belly part does not look scary at all. In contrast to normal spiders, they even move rather slowly and ponderously, you might almost find them …

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The Red-legged Golden Orb-web Spider

Nephila madagascariensis

Most travelers are more frightened by the sight of a spider, but the Red-Legged Golden Orb-Web Spider (Trichonephila inaurata madagascariensis) can teach some people otherwise. The female, including her legs, is as big as a human hand, the body is black with a golden-yellow, white-grey lined stripe on the back, the legs are broadly striped in black and red. The …

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Insects, arthropods and arachnids in general

Schmetterling

Presumably, the largest wealth of species of Madagascar can be found in insects, arthropods and arachnids. Several thousand species could it be, rather more – especially since many of them are neither discovered nor described yet. Famous and bizarre at the same time is the giraffe-necked weevil. The males of this species got red wings and have a long, giraffe-like, …

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