A new species of Thrixopelma (Araneae: Theraphosidae: Theraphosinae) from southern Peru

ABSTRACT

This work aims to describe a new species of Thrixopelma Schmidt, 1994 from southcentral Peru in the Department of Cusco. Thrixopelma choquequirao sp. nov. can be easily distinguished from congeneric species by the low number of labial cuspules, a very long palpal tibia, morphology of the male palpal bulb and female spermathecae. Currently the genus Thrixopelma comprises seven formally described species which inhabit Perú and Ecuador, distributed in Amazonian rainforest, Coastal Dry Forest, and Andean Dry Forest.

KEYWORDS:

• Taxonomy
• Tarantula
• Neotropical
• South America
• Choquequirao

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the Centro de Recursos Naturales Renovables de la Zona Semiárida for the use of the research facilities. NF thanks the Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. JCC and JAO thank the Gobierno Regional Cusco and the Project ‘Instalación del servicio de protección y conservación de la biodiversidad del Área de Conservación Regional Choquequirao en los distritos de Mollepata y Santa Teresa, Provincias de Anta y La Convención de la Región Cusco.’ The collection permit is RD D00051-2022- MIDAGRI-SERFOR-DGGSPFFS-DGSPFS - Nº AUT-IFS-2022-038 from Servicio Nacional Forestal y de Fauna Silvestre of Perú.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Agencia Nacional de Promoción de la Investigación, el Desarrollo Tecnológico y la Innovación [PICT 2018-1751]; Secretaría General de Ciencia y Tecnología, Universidad Nacional del Sur [24ZB/87].