Family THERIDIIDAE Sundevall, 1833

Latrodectus hasseltii

© Copyright Curtis Morton

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Introduction

The Theridiidae include the well known and highly venomous Redback and Brown Widow spiders (Latrodectus hasseltii and L. geometricus). However, they are a large, diverse spider family that can be difficult to separate from other families. The classical diagnostic character — the presence of serrate setae on tarsus IV — can be difficult to observe. Moreover, this character is also found in the closely related Nesticidae. Theridiids occur over all of Australia, in a variety of habitats.

Although Episinus Walckenaer in Latreille, 1809 specimens unidentified to species are known from state museums, it is doubtful whether the genus occurs in Australia, as Yoshida and Koh (2011) removed Janula Strand, 1932 from synonymy which is supported by the work of Rodrigues et al. (2022).

Diagnosis

Among the araneoids, theridiids differ from nesticids, and most other spiders, by the cup-shaped male palpal tibia.

General References

Rodrigues, E., Rodrigues, P., Brescovit, A., & Koh, J. 2022. An update on the phylogeny of Spintharinae with analysis based on morphological characters and taxonomy of Janula (Araneae, Theridiidae). Organisms, Diversity and Evolution 22: 749–787

Yoshida, H., & Koh, J. K. H. 2011. Phoroncidia, Janula and a new genus Brunepisinus (Araneae: Theridiidae) from Brunei. Acta Arachnologica 60: 75–78

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