Nature & Environment

Giant harvestman discovered in Laos

By T.K. Randall
October 18, 2012 ·  19 comments

Image Credit: Fernando S. Aldado Dr. Peter Jäger had been in Laos to film scenes for a TV show and was spending some of his spare time collecting spider specimens from caves in Khammouan province. "In one of the caves I discovered a harvestman that was absolutely huge," he said. The giant insect had a leg span of 33cm making it one of the largest in the world, however because Dr. Jäger specializes in spiders he was unable to properly categorize the new find.

"It's a shame we can't identify such an exceptional discovery correctly, i.e. its species," he said. "We haven't dealt with these and related genera from China and neighbouring South East Asia before. Specialists are also unavailable due to the fact that descriptive taxonomy is no longer the main focus of research funding."[!gad]Dr. Peter Jäger had been in Laos to film scenes for a TV show and was spending some of his spare time collecting spider specimens from caves in Khammouan province. "In one of the caves I discovered a harvestman that was absolutely huge," he said. The giant insect had a leg span of 33cm making it one of the largest in the world, however because Dr. Jäger specializes in spiders he was unable to properly categorize the new find.

"It's a shame we can't identify such an exceptional discovery correctly, i.e. its species," he said. "We haven't dealt with these and related genera from China and neighbouring South East Asia before. Specialists are also unavailable due to the fact that descriptive taxonomy is no longer the main focus of research funding."

Source: Science Daily | Comments (19)

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