Staffordshire celebrates new spider species

Staffordshire celebrates new spider species

Autumn brings with it Halloween, which has long been associated with spiders and their spooky but wondrous webs. A fitting time of year to share some exciting spider related news.

This summer a new species ofĀ spiderĀ was discovered at one of Staffordshire Wildlife Trustā€™s nature reserves. Joshua Styles, an ecologist and botanist who has featured as a presenter on Countryfile, made the chance find while he was helping the Trust with a vegetation survey at Black Firs and Cranberry Bog reserve.

The spider, a Gnaphosa nigerrima, has only been known to inhabit one other place in the UK before.

Joshua said: ā€œIt was any normal day for me during summer, doing a botanical survey atĀ Black Firs andĀ Cranberry bog. That was before I noticed a fleck of velvety black in the corner of my eye. Only a few weeks previous I remember seeing news about one of the rarestĀ spidersĀ in Britain, Gnaphosa nigerrima, known only from Wybunbury Moss. I caught theĀ spiderĀ for photographs, just because it looked so incredibly similar.

ā€œLater down the line, thatĀ spiderĀ was found out to be the very same species, the second ever British site! Although it might not have been a plant, it was really exciting!ā€

Wybunbury Moss has a very similar landscape toĀ Black Firs and Cranberry Bog, itā€™s situated just over four miles away near Nantwich and is a National Nature Reserve owned and managed by Natural England.

Jeff Sim, Head of Nature Reserves and Species Recovery, said: ā€œWeā€™re really excited by this discovery, and thankful for Joshuaā€™s eagle eye!

ā€œBlack Firs and Cranberry Bog is aĀ Site of Special Scientific Interest and a Ramsar site, a wetland of international importance. Itā€™sĀ very fragile and there is no publicĀ access toĀ the area where the spider was foundĀ as it's such a dangerous site with a floating raft of peat over an eight-metre-deep pool. However, this is the perfect habitat for theĀ Gnaphosa nigerrima.

ā€œOther than the site in Cheshire the spider is known to be widespread in the cooler parts of Europe and Asia. In north-western and central Europe, it has been recorded from Belgium, Sweden, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, the Czech Republic and Poland.ā€