Peacock Spider

Until recently, that is the last 10 years or so, very few species of peacock spiders were known, and then all of a sudden an avalanche of new species appeared, as if out of nowhere. The first peacock spider was reported in 1874 and a handful were added in the following years, but in 2005, when I started to get interested in them, still only a total of six species had been recognised. But now ten years later, it stands at 92. What was responsible for this sudden jump? 

I generally get credited with popularizing peacock spiders, and I think there is a good chance that if I hadn’t found and photographed one of them in 2005, they would still largely be unknown today, certainly a lot less known. My photographs and videos and the descriptions that I produced together with my long time collaborator David Hill (see Peckhamia), undoubtedly were the catalayst for what has happened since. More and more people became interested in these spiders and started to look for them, and so new species were discovered. However, the story would be incomplete without bringing in David Knowles, who is in some respects an unsung hero of the peacock spider story, and I therefore want to devote this story to him. David Knowles lives in Perth and runs a business doing environmental education and biodiversity surveys.  At the time that I started popularising peacock spiders, only a handful of species were known by name. David had in fact discovered and photographed more than two dozen species, as far back as 1985, decades before I had even become aware of peacock spiders.  But he did not keep specimens.

I will tell you how we met, in August 2012, but before I do so, I want to paint a picture of what the world of peacock spiders looked like then, so that you understand what impact David had. So, in 2012 I had tracked down and photographed all seven Maratus species that were known at the time: volans, vespertilio, pavonis, splendens, amabilis, mungaich and linnaei. I had also, together with David Hill, described a brand new species, Maratus harrisi, named after its discoverer Stuart Harris. I was quite proud of my achievement, as I had spent a lot of time searching and photographing these spiders, I had made some popular YouTube videos with the footage I got and I was becoming more and more known for my work on peacock spiders. But there didn’t seem to be all that much more to do now, except taking more photographs of the same species. 

There was some indication that more of these colourful spiders were out there to discover. I knew for example, that Julianne Waldock from Perth had found additional species, and close to my home I also found species that looked like they could be unnamed peacock spiders. So maybe a little bit more work could be invested. However, not in my wildest dreams could I have imagined the kind of diversity that was about to unfold, and that moment came when Robert Whyte introduced me to David Knowles.

Robert Whyte, well known for his recent book on Australian spiders, introduced David and I via email and David responded by describing how he had found an “explosion of peacock spiders” when he explored the bush in the 1990s, mostly looking for other critters such as jewel beetles. He also explained that, after realizing that nothing was known about these spiders, he wanted to publicise his findings at the time, similar to what I did later. It was still the pre-internet days, so he approached a well known magazine and submitted an article which he hoped they would publish. However, his manuscript was rejected, under mysterious circumstances. David might tell you his thoughts about this if you ask. From then on he kept his observations and photographs to himself. Now though, 25 years later, he was seeing the excitement that was starting to build around these spiders, and he decided that it was time to share his photogrpahs with me. How lucky!

I remember well the day when his first email with the subject “Maratus crew” dropped into my inbox. The email read “Morning gentelmen! ”, addressed to me and Rob Whyte. “Here begins my 26 year adventure with Maratus….”. Attached were photographs of two species, that were both unknown to me.  David called them “2-blotch Sapphire Whitesock Salspider and 2-dot Maskback Peacock Salspider”. The following day another email arrived, with another species, this time “Orangeblotch Aqua Peacock Salspider”, then cam “Beige Whitesock peacock Salspider”, “Muted Lozengeback Peacock Salspider”, “Blacktail Tufted Peacock Salspider”, “Opalback Stripeleg Whitesock Salspider”, and “Topaz Rowblotch Peacock Salspider”…..and so on. It was like Christmas spread out over several days, and each day I could unwrap another present I was keenly awaiting the next email from David, wondering what colours and patterns he may reveal this time to me. I was sad when it finally finished and there was nothing more to come. 

The photographs that David had sent me were not just of the spiders themselves, he had made artistic collages of the spider and shots he took of their environment. Something I hadn’t seen before in quite the same way and I certainly found intriguing. You will find them all at the end of this story. And David’s descriptive names also added to the charm, it was an exciting package. A couple of the spiders he presented to me had in the meantime been given scientific names, for example Maratus linnaei had recently been described by Julianne Waldock, but the large majority were still unnamed or undescribed as taxonomists say. And of course their courtship display, including that of those that had been named, had not been observed or documented. Unfortunately David did not collect specimens that could have been used to officially name and describe his spiders, so to do so we needed to go on a hunt. Finding David’s spiders and documenting their behaviour had become my priority from hereon and the path ahead was staked out.

At the time I write this, in 2021, most of David’s spiders have a scientific name. It took several trips to Western Australia, hundreds of hours in searching and even more time in their actual study but the job is now done. David Knowles and I tracked them down one by one, and David Hill and I named them. There were set backs, for example David broke his leg during one of our joint expeditions, and we got hopelessly bogged one day in a swamp. And sometimes David could not remember exactly where he had seen these spiders, it was just too long ago, so our search became like the one for the needle in the haystack. But I guess it was all part of the adventure. 

Although we were just trying to locate spiders that David had already seen, we actually found quite a few new ones along the way, unexpectedly. Examples for such bycatch are Maratus electricus and Maratus vespa. Perhaps an even better example is Maratus bubo. I always liked the story about how we discovered this species, so I will briefly tell it here. We had been looking for a spider David called “Hokey Pokey” and after a lot of searching eventually located some individuals at a place that seemed to match what David could remember. I didn’t even think about looking closer at the animal, we were both convinced we had finally found “Hokey Pokey”, so after collecting a few individuals we moved on. Days later when I eventually took photographs, I realized to my absolute amazement, that the spider we had found was a totally new one, and a very striking one at that, with a pattern on its back resembling the face of an owl. David Hill and I later named that spider Maratus bubo and “Hokey Pokey” continued to elude us for a while longer. 

So going back to to our original question.  Why was there such an explosion of new peacock spiders species, in particular in Western Australia, when for a couple of hundred years only a handful were known. Why did personatus, pardus, tortus, tessellatus, trigonus, vultus, boranup, flavus and many other charismatic species all of a sudden come out of the woodwork ?  Several people discovered new peacock spiders during that time, so it can’t all be attributed to the efforts of one individual. But there is no doubt that if David Knowles hadn’t decided to share his previous discoveries with me, our progress would be much less impressive. 

The following is a gallery of photographs sent to me by David Knowles. They are all copyright David Knowles and can only be use with his permission. These photographs were taken in the 1980s and 1990s, at the time when almost all of these spider were still unnamed.