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Bird Dung Spider

Cyrtarachne

Photo by JordiPrats
Published on Project Noah
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-8.5033, 115.255

Field Notes

Description:

Light brown colour, about 25mm aprox. total large, with a large abdomen with 2 big brown spots.
Cyrtarachne is a species of orb-weaving spider which is commonly known as Bird-dropping Spider because this is what they seem, it's also believed to mimicry a snail as a form of protection from predators.

Habitat:

Spotted at Campuhan Ridge Walk, Ubud - Bali.
It aslo can be found in India (Kerala), Japan, China, Korea, Taiwan and Myanmar.

Notes:

Spiders of the genus Cyrtarachne are known to feed mainly on moths. Webs of these spiders have several unique characteristics: they are horizontal, have widely spaced spiral thread, the spiral thread has low shear joint (one end of a spiral connected to a radius breaks easily), and the viscid “spanning” threads are coated with a unique glue capable of adhering to moths.

Other source about this spider spotted at Bali Island:
http://www.baliwildlife.com/photogallerycategory/spiders/page/2/

Classification:
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Arachnida
Order: Araneae
Family: Araneidae
Genus: Cyrtarachne

Species ID Suggestions

Comments (21)

Just found another source with a spotting of Cyrtarachne spider in Bali: http://www.baliwildlife.com/photogallerycategory/spiders/page/2/
Thanks Jordi. If not C. inaequalis it is a very similar species. I think that Bali is quite underscribed and undercollected. This document lists no Cyrtarachne species for Bali: http://www.cacaospiders.com/IndonesianSpiders_2011.pdf
According to WSCA (World Spider Catalog) Cyrtarachne inaequalis distribution is India, China, Korea & Myanmar http://www.wsc.nmbe.ch/species/3733
Thanks Leuba, António, Gilma and Felix.
Congratulations on the SOTD - great mimic indeed !
Congratulations Jordi, this stunning spider is our Spotting of the Day! Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/projectnoah/photos/a.10150595289465603.674700.10150120463815603/10157793926240603/?type=3&theater Twitter: https://twitter.com/projectnoah/status/800113960146104324
Ok Daniele, agree will leave by now at genus level, I checked some spider lists for Indonesia but not found.
Online images of C. bufo show it being much whiter. Have you found any species listed for Bali? In doubt my suggestion would be to leave it at genus level. I would like to feature it but we don't want to populate the internet with incorrect IDs ;-)
Thanks Daniele for the advise, yes I think you are right as C. Inaequalis looks more similar in colour. Anyway I checked the 'Checklist of spiders from Indonesia and New Guinea' (2011)/ Kathrin Stenchly / Department of Crop Sciences, Agroecology, Georg-August-University Goettingen, Germany as well as web based sources and still cannot find this specimen in Bali.
Great images Jordi! Are we sure this is C. bufo? There are many species in the genus Cyrtarachne and I found it hard to find information about its distribution to Bali.This seems a better match to C. inaequalis for instance: http://symbiota4.acis.ufl.edu/scan/portal//taxa/index.php?taxon=387807&taxauthid=1 http://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/360439-Cyrtarachne-inaequalis
Wow! That's a great find and nice pictures too :D

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