Davus Explained

Davus, also known as the tiger rump tarantulas,^[1] is a genus of spiders in the family Theraphosidae (tarantulas). It was formerly included in Cyclosternum. They are medium to large tarantulas, found in Central America and Mexico.^[2]

Diagnosis

They are characterized by the opisthosomal pattern which are made of several red-orange stripes. Though further identification between species is decided mainly on the palpal bulb and spermatheca morphology. As Davus pentaloris owns a high variations of size, patterning and morphology.

Species

, the World Spider Catalog accepted the following species:

• Davus fasciatus O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1892 (type species) – Costa Rica, Panama
• Davus pentaloris (Simon, 1888) – Mexico, Guatemala
• Davus ruficeps (Simon, 1891) – Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras
• Davus santos Gabriel, 2016 – Panama

In synonymy

• Davus drymusetes (Valerio, 1982) = Davus fasciatus
• Davus morosum (Banks, 1909) = Davus ruficeps
• Davus mozinno Estrada-Alvarez, 2014 = Davus pentaloris
• Davus zebratum (Banks, 1909) = Davus ruficeps

Notes and References

1. Web site: Tiger Rump Tarantulas (Genus Davus). iNaturalist.ca. en. 2019-11-26.
2. Candia-Ramírez . Daniela T . Francke . Oscar F . 2021-05-01 . Another stripe on the tiger makes no difference? Unexpected diversity in the widespread tiger tarantula Davus pentaloris (Araneae: Theraphosidae: Theraphosinae) . Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society . 192 . 1 . 75–104 . 10.1093/zoolinnean/zlaa107 . 0024-4082.