Tetragnatha
Temporal range: Palaeogene– Present
female T. extensa
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Subphylum: Chelicerata
Class: Arachnida
Order: Araneae
Infraorder: Araneomorphae
Family: Tetragnathidae
Genus: Tetragnatha
Latreille, 1804[1]
Type species
T. extensa
Species

320, see text

Synonyms[1]
  • Arundognatha Wiehle, 1963[2]
  • Eucta Simon, 1881[2]
  • Prionolaema Simon, 1894[3]

Tetragnatha is a genus of long-jawed orb-weavers found all over the world. It was first described by Pierre André Latreille in 1804,[4] and it contains hundreds of species. Most occur in the tropics and subtropics, and many can run over water. They are commonly called stretch spiders in reference to their elongated body form and their ability to hide on blades of grass or similar elongated substrates by stretching their front legs forward and the others behind them. The name Tetragnatha is derived from Greek, tetra- a numerical prefix referring to four and gnatha meaning "jaw". Evolution to cursorial behavior occurred long ago in a few different species, the most studied being those found on the Hawaiian islands.[5] One of the biggest and most common species is T. extensa, which has a holarctic distribution. It can be found near lakes, river banks or swamps.[6] Large numbers of individuals can often be found in reeds, tall grass, and around minor trees and shrubs.

Tetragnatha species are hard to separate from each other without a microscope to scrutinize the genitalia of a mature individual.[7]

Cursorial species found on Hawaiian archipelago

The Tetragnatha spiders found on the Hawaiian archipelago are believed to have no more than three colonization events, two from web building species and one from cursorial species. This is because a species of mainland Tetragnatha spider was found to be more closely related to web building spiders on the Hawaiian islands than the cursorial species.[5] This means that the divergence of web building and cursorial spiders must have occurred off the islands. There have been many events of cursorial evolution in various spider species around the world,[8] including a few Tetragnatha species, although many species have not been thoroughly studied. The factors leading to this change of behavior is not well understood, although study of the Hawaiian Tetragnatha species can lead to some suggestions. Environmental factors, such as landscape[9] and prey diversity play an important role in influencing the structure of webs in web building spiders.[10] This could be a reasonable explanation for the loss of web function and evolving to a cursorial behavior.

Species

Unknown species
Tetragnatha species resting on jewelweed
Tetragnatha sp. mating
The eye arrangement of spiders in the genus Tetragnatha
Tetragnatha sp. juvenile in Texas
Pair of silver long-jawed orb weaver spiders interacting, laying silk and losing the cranefly they were consuming to ants

As of March 2021 it contains 320 species and ten subspecies, found all over the world, including Greenland:[1]

In synonymy:

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c "Gen. Tetragnatha Latreille, 1804". World Spider Catalog Version 20.0. Natural History Museum Bern. 2019. doi:10.24436/2. Retrieved 2019-12-01.
  2. ^ a b Levi, H. W. (1981). "The American orb-weaver genera Dolichognatha and Tetragnatha north of Mexico (Araneae: Araneidae, Tetragnathinae)". Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology. 149: 282.
  3. ^ Dimitrov, D.; Álvarez-Padilla, F.; Hormiga, G. (2008). "Until dirt do us apart: On the unremarkable palp morphology of the spider Sternospina concretipalpis Schmidt & Krause, 1993, with comments on the genus Prionolaema Simon, 1894 (Araneae, Tetragnathidae)". Zootaxa. 1698: 51. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.1698.1.3.
  4. ^ Latreille, P. A. (1804). "Tableau methodique des Insectes". Nouveau Dictionnaire d'Histoire Naturelle, Paris. 24: 129–295.
  5. ^ a b Casquet, Juliane; Bourgeois, Yann X. C.; Cruaud, Corinne; Gavory, Frédérick; Gillespie, Rosemary G.; Thébaud, Christophe (2015). "Community assembly on remote islands: a comparison of Hawaiian and Mascarene spiders". Journal of Biogeography. 42 (1): 39–50. doi:10.1111/jbi.12391. ISSN 1365-2699. S2CID 83565719.
  6. ^ Hänggi, Ambros; Stöckli, Edi; Nentwig, Wolfgang (1995). Lebensräume Mitteleuropäischer Spinnen. Miscellanea Faunistica Helvetiae – Centre suisse de cartographie de la faune, Neuchatel. ISBN 2-88414-008-5.
  7. ^ "Tetragnatha montana". NatureSpot. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  8. ^ Kallal, Robert J.; Kulkarni, Siddharth S.; Dimitrov, Dimitar; Benavides, Ligia R.; Arnedo, Miquel A.; Giribet, Gonzalo; Hormiga, Gustavo (2021). "Converging on the orb: denser taxon sampling elucidates spider phylogeny and new analytical methods support repeated evolution of the orb web". Cladistics. 37 (3): 298–316. doi:10.1111/cla.12439. hdl:11250/2754972. ISSN 1096-0031. PMID 34478199. S2CID 228966334.
  9. ^ Vandergast, Amy G.; Gillespie, Rosemary G.; Roderick, George K. (2004-04-27). "Influence of volcanic activity on the population genetic structure of Hawaiian Tetragnatha spiders: fragmentation, rapid population growth and the potential for accelerated evolution: POPULATION GENETICS OF HAWAIIAN TETRAGNATHA". Molecular Ecology. 13 (7): 1729–1743. doi:10.1111/j.1365-294X.2004.02179.x. PMID 15189199. S2CID 10090815.
  10. ^ Kennedy, Susan; Lim, Jun Ying; Clavel, Joanne; Krehenwinkel, Henrik; Gillespie, Rosemary G. (2019). Godoy, Oscar (ed.). "Spider webs, stable isotopes and molecular gut content analysis: Multiple lines of evidence support trophic niche differentiation in a community of Hawaiian spiders". Functional Ecology. 33 (9): 1722–1733. doi:10.1111/1365-2435.13361. ISSN 0269-8463. S2CID 182857924.
  11. ^ Koch, L. (1872). Die Arachniden Australiens, nach der Natur beschrieben und abgebildet [Erster Theil, Lieferung 3-7] [The Arachnids of Australia, described and illustrated from nature [Part I, Series 3-7]] (in German). Bauer & Raspe, Nürnberg. p. 190. doi:10.5962/bhl.title.121660.
  12. ^ Marples, B. J. "Spiders from some Pacific islands, II." (1957)

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