Revision of the new Australasian orb-weaving spider genus Salsa (Araneae, Araneidae)

Volker W Framenau; Pedro de S Castanheira

doi:10.3897/zookeys.1102.82388

Revision of the new Australasian orb-weaving spider genus Salsa (Araneae, Araneidae)

Zookeys. 2022 May 20:1102:107-148. doi: 10.3897/zookeys.1102.82388. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Volker W Framenau^{1

2

3}, Pedro de S Castanheira¹

Affiliations

¹ Harry Butler Institute, Murdoch University, 90 South St, Murdoch, Western Australia 6150, Australia Murdoch University Murdoch Australia.
² Department of Terrestrial Zoology, Western Australian Museum, Locked Bag 49, Welshpool DC, Western Australia, 6986, Australia Western Australian Museum Welshpool Australia.
³ Zoological Museum Hamburg, Leibnitz Institute for the Analysis of Biodiversity Change (LIB), Centre for Taxonomy & Morphology, Martin-Luther-King-Platz 3, 20146 Hamburg, Germany Zoological Museum Hamburg Hamburg Germany.

Abstract

A new Australasian genus in the orb-weaving spider family Araneidae Clerck, 1757 is described to include seven species: Salsafuliginata (L. Koch, 1871) comb. nov. (type species; = Epeirarubicundula Keyserling, 1887) syn. nov.) (Australia, introduced to New Zealand); S.brisbanae (L. Koch, 1867) comb. nov. (Australia); S.canalae (Berland, 1924) comb. nov. (New Caledonia); S.neneba sp. nov. (Papua New Guinea); S.recherchensis (Main, 1954) comb. nov. (Australia); S.rueda sp. nov. (Australia); and S.tartara sp. nov. (Australia; Lord Howe Island endemic). Salsa gen. nov. belongs to the Australasian informal backobourkiine clade and differs from other genera of this clade by a distinct abdominal shape (single posterior abdominal tubercle) and ventral colouration (pale lateral spindle-shaped bands), male pedipalp morphology (C-shaped median apophysis that has teeth-like tubercles inside the basal arch) and the shape of the female epigyne scape (partially translucent and generally shorter than the epigyne plate). Based mainly on male pedipalp morphology within the backobourkiines, Salsa gen. nov. has closest morphological affinities with Acroaspis Karsch, 1878 and Socca Framenau, Castanheira & Vink, 2022.

Keywords: Australia; Pacific; South-east Asia; backobourkiines; systematics; taxonomy.

Volker W. Framenau, Pedro de S. Castanheira.