If Australia didn’t already have a metric shit-tonne of creepy crawlies and things with more eyes than legs, three more have been officially added to the list and just to make you feel more comfortable about it all – they’re part of the jumping spider family. Yep, three new variants of Peacock Spider have been discovered in southwestern Australia.
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Peacock Spiders have had a pretty solid few years in Western Australia, with several new species being found over the last five or so years. In late 2017, Project Maratus found and named five new species of the wee jumpy boys, and have found new ones here and there since then.
This week, the Project Maratus team have come across three new species, which are now named Maratus aquilus, Maratus felinus, and Maratus combustus. Here ya go, take a look at ’em.
Meet Australia’s three newest species! Here are three brand new peacock spiders that I described from Southwestern Australia, discovered by Project Maratus. As of today they are officially named: Maratus aquilus, Maratus felinus, and Maratus combustus. pic.twitter.com/eDV6JeCMAp
— Joseph Schubert 🕷️ (@arachno_joe) March 5, 2019
Ok fair enough, these spiders are apparently about the size of a grain of rice and can’t actually hurt you. They’re also really brilliantly coloured, and do fancy little dances for their prospective mate when they’re trying to court them. It’s uh, pretty damn cute.
Look at him! He’s throwing his little spidey hands up and shaking his tiny spidey butt all over the place. Could you imagine if humans did this? We’d look ridiculous.
I could just sit her e and watching spider dancing videos all day. It probably wouldn’t be a great use of my time but hey, sometimes you just have to lean into the online rabbit holes that you fall down.
Tiny fancy spiders in 4k! Doing fun choreography!
I’m a huge arachnophobe and my immediate reaction to seeing a spider in real life is to dry-heave, but watching these make me think that these lil’ guys are just doing what their name implies – peacocking around trying to impress everyone.
Well little dude, consider me bloody impressed.
