User:Cladomelea/sandbox

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Cladomelea (talk · contribs) This user has declared a connection. (I am Len de Beer the person who the spider is named after, and a friend of the person who found it John Roff)

Cladomelea debeeri also known as The de Beers Bolas spider was observed at 45 Milliken Road Pietermaritzburg South Africa, between 9-14 May 2000, by John Roff, a South African naturalist and educator, he was certain that he had not seen it before, being familiar with Cladomelea ackermani from the Umgeni valley nature reserve. A comparison of images of the two species reveals clear differences.

"The spider was observed by Roff over a period of four nights during 9–12 May 2000, and photographs and a video were taken. Several observations were made each night. On 12 May the female was collected and preserved in 70% alcohol. The egg sacs were kept for observation until June 2000. The type material is housed in the National Collection of Arachnida (NCA), at the Plant Protection Research Institute, an institute of the Agricultural Research Council." ^[1]T

The spider was apparently encountered for a second time and photographed by an individual called Loots Juan in Lydenberg, the images were posted to the South African spider club facebook page but removed shortly thereafter.

The spider was encountered a third time by Roff in the Hilton College Nature Reserve seventeen years later in a Dombeya rotundifolia tree on 3 May 2017. It would seem that May is the time to search for this spider in the remnants of the Natal savanna biome.^[2]

The habitat of this spider is threatened by development. "In KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), SA, 7.6% (721 733 ha) of natural habitat was lost to anthropogenic conversion in only six years.^[3] Hence, there is an urgent need to assess the impact of habitat loss on vegetation types in KZN."

The presence of this spider may serve as an added incentive to conserve the endangered Natal savanna biome.

References

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^ Jewitt et al. 2015b

Bibliography

Jewitt, D., 2018, ‘Vegetation type conservation targets, status and level of protection in KwaZulu-Natal in 2016’,Bothalia 48(1), a2294. https://doi.org/10.4102/ abc.v48i1.2294
Jewitt, D., Goodman, P.S., Erasmus, B.F.N., O’Connor, T.G. & Witkowski, E.T.F., 2015b, ‘Systematic land-cover change in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa: Implications for biodiversity’, South African Journal of Science 111(9/10), Art. #2015-0019, 1–9. https://doi.org/10.17159/sajs.2015/20150019

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[3] Jewitt et al. 2015b

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