Spider found in Mauritius like discovering 'hidden treasure'

Scientists have said they are "completely stunned" after discovering a new species of spider.

A team from Jersey's Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust was working with partners on the Mauritian island of Ilot Vacoas when the arachnid was spotted along a stretch of rock along the coast in 2023.

The charity said the discovery was confirmed as a new species of trapdoor spider which was named the Mauritian tidal trapdoor spider (Idioctis marevallum).

Dr Max Tercel, the entomologist who found the spider, said it felt like uncovering a "hidden treasure".

Recalling the discovery, Tercel said he found the spider on "a stretch of coastal rock with sparse vegetation".

It was "not somewhere we expected to find something so remarkable", he said.

"It was dark by then and I was carefully searching through crevices with my head torch when, to my astonishment, I noticed a familiar pattern - a spider's legs extending from its burrow, something I'd only ever seen before in lush forests and grasslands," he said.

Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust said rather than digging its own burrow like other trapdoor spiders, the Mauritian tidal spider lived in tubes in coralline bedrock believed to be created by worms and molluscs thousands of years ago.

The spider seals the entrance with a trapdoor made from silk, sand and algae, the trust said, with its home completely submerged at high tide and repeatedly hit by waves.

Nik Cole, Mauritius country manager at Durrell, said the discovery was "incredibly exciting".

He said: "The thing I remember most is Max screaming at me to come over because he'd just seen a mygalomorph - a trapdoor spider.

"I couldn't believe something from the same group as tarantulas could be living in a place like this.

"I was up all night, holding my phone in the air trying to get a signal and searching for any evidence of a spider like this in Mauritius."

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