New species of venomous spider as big as your face discovered in Sri Lanka
A NEW species of tarantula with a stomach-churning 20cm leg span has been discovered. NOW WITH HORROR VIDEO.
A NEW species of venomous spider has been discovered in Sri Lanka - and it's about the size of a human face.
The tarantulas have a stomach-churning 20cm leg-span, distinctive daffodil-yellow markings on their legs and a pink band around their bodies.
They were found living in the old doctor’s quarters of a hospital in the war-torn northern province of Mankulam by scientists from Sri Lanka’s Biodiversity Education and Research (BER) organisation.
The arachnids have been named Poecilotheria rajaei, in honour of Michael Rajakumar Purajah, a senior police official who led the research team through a hazardous stretch of jungle ravaged by civil unrest.
As a group, the spiders are related to a class of South American tarantula that includes the Goliath bird-eater, the world’s largest.
The species was first seen in October 2009 after villagers presented a male specimen that they had killed to BER co-founder Ranil Nanayakkara.
Nanayakkara immediately realised that the dead arachnid did not resemble known Poecilotheria in the area and put together a team to hunt down its living relatives.
Eventually, the team found enough spiders — including the ones hiding in a hospital — to assemble a detailed description of the new arachnids, releasing photographs after years of research.
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