Rhene pinguis

Rhene pinguis is a species of jumping spider, a member of the family Salticidae, that was first described by Wanda Wesołowska and Charles Haddad in 2013.{{cite web|author=World Spider Catalog|year=2023|title=Rhene pinguis Wesolowska & Haddad, 2009|website=World Spider Catalog|publisher=Natural History Museum|place=Bern|url=http://www.wsc.nmbe.ch/species/32385|version=23.5|access-date=4 January 2023}} They allocated it to the genus Rhene, which is named after the Greek female name shared by mythological figures.{{sfn|Thorell|1869|page=37}} The specific name "pinguis", means fat or thick, and relates to the swollen look of the spider.{{sfn|Wesołowska|Haddad|2009|page=78}}

First circumscribed in 1869 by Tamerlan Thorell, the genus Rhene is a part of the subtribe Dendryphantina in the tribe Dendryphantini.{{sfn|Wesołowska|Russell-Smith|2022|page=100}}{{sfn|Maddison|2015|page=245}} Wayne Maddison allocated the tribe to the subclade Simonida in the clade Saltafresia in the clade Salticoida.{{sfn|Maddison|2015|page=278}} It is related to the genera Dendryphantes and Macaroeris. The genus is also similar to Homalattus.{{sfn|Maddison|2015|pages=246, 278}} In 2017, Jerzy Prószyński designated it a member of a group of genera named Dendryphantines after the genus Dendryphantes.{{sfn|Prószyński|2017|pages=88, 92}} He also noted that it is similar to the genera related to Simaetha, a group he named Simaethines, particularly in the shape of spider's body. {{sfn|Prószyński|2017|page=17}} The genus is known for its good eyesight and its high level of spatial awareness, which is likely to show that it is recent in evolutionary terms.{{sfn|Su|Meier|Jackson|Harland|2007|page=1485}}

Like many in the genus, Rhene pinguis resembles a beetle.{{sfn|Maddison|2015|page=254}} The spider was first identified in 2009, with initially only the male described by Wesołowska and Haddad. The female was first described in 2018 by the same team. The spider is hairy, thickset, and very flat. The spider's body is divided into two main parts: a cephalothorax and an abdomen. The male's carapace, the hard upper part of the cephalothorax, is brown and covered in dense brown hairs, with a small number of white scales visible near the back. It is nearly square in shape and typically has a length of {{convert|1.7|mm|in|abbr=on|2}} and width of {{convert|1.8|mm|in|abbr=on|2}}. The spider's eye field is large and trapezoid, dominating the majority of the upper surface. There are black rings around the eyes, some of which are placed close together. The underside of the cephalothorax, or sternum, is dark brown. The spider's face, known as the clypeus, is dark and very low. Its mouthparts, its chelicerae, labium and maxillae are dark brown, and it has a single tooth visible.{{sfn|Wesołowska|Haddad|2009|pages=78–79}}

The spider's abdomen is very flat, rounded and overlaps the carapace at the front. It is typically {{convert|2|mm|in|abbr=on|2}} long and {{convert|1.6|mm|in|abbr=on|2}} wide and has a pattern of white patches formed of hairs near its spinnerets and six more white patches in the middle. The abdomen is dominated by a dark brown scutum on the top, the underside being a lighter brown. Most of the spider's legs are brown with yellow segments. In contrast, its front legs are black and covered in black hairs. They have two spines and are larger and thicker than the others.{{sfn|Wesołowska|Haddad|2009|pages=78–79}}

Rhene pinguis has distinctive copulatory organs. Its pedipalps are brown with a hairy cymbium that overshadows its similarly large but convex and bulging tegulum. There is a meandering spermophore inside the tegulum and a very short embolus emanating from the haematodocha at the top. The small palpal tibia has a short hooked projection, called a tibial apophysis.{{sfn|Wesołowska|Haddad|2009|page=79}} The embolus has a wide vane at its tip that distinguishes the species from others in the genus.{{sfn|Wesołowska|Haddad|2009|page=78}}

The female has a cephalothorax that has a length between {{convert|1.2|and|1.5|mm|in|abbr=on|2}} and width of between 1.2 and {{convert|1.4|mm|in|abbr=on|2}} It is similarly flattened with a dark brown carapace and has a similarly large trapezoidal eye field. There are small spots formed of white hairs between the eyes and a stripe down the middle of its carapace. Its sternum is brown, as are its mouthparts, although there are light tips at the end of its labium and maxillae. Its abdomen is a brown oval that measures between 1.4 and 2.0 mm in length and between 1.3 and 1.6 in width. It has a covering of dense brown hairs and a pattern of fourteen white spots arranged in pairs along its back. The underside of its abdomen is darker and its spinnerets are brown. Its legs are all light brown and short with white hairs visible on some sections.{{sfn|Wesołowska|Haddad|2018|page=903}}

The female spider has a round epigyne with two copulatory openings to the front that are plugged with a waxy secretion. They lead via basket-like structures that show high levels of sclerotization that hide their path as it winds to the sides to two thin insemination ducts that sit in the middle of the openings. The ducts loop twice before entering two similarly sclerotized spermathecae, or receptacles.The epigyne differs from Rhene formosa in details, including having shorter insemination ducts and larger spermathecae.{{sfn|Wesołowska|Haddad|2018|pages=902, 903}} It also lacks the accessory glands connected near the start of the insemination ducts that characterise the otherwise similar Rhene hexagon.{{sfn|Wiśniewski|Wesołowska|2024|page=118}}

Although Dendryphantine spiders a predominantly found in the Americas, Rhene spiders live in Africa and Eurasia.{{sfn|Maddison|2015|page=245}} Rhene pinguis is endemic to South Africa. It has only been found in the Ndumo Game Reserve

In KwaZulu-Natal.{{sfn|Wesołowska|Haddad|2018|page=903}} The first specimen was found in 2000 living amongst the small shrubs.{{sfn|Wesołowska|Haddad|2009|page=79}} It lives in trees, including the canopy of Albizia versicolor and Ficus sycomorus trees.{{sfn|Wesołowska|Haddad|2018|page=903}}

Drawings of [http://www.jumping-spiders.com/php/tax_drawings.php?id=7248 Rhene pinguis].

{{Reflist|30em}}

{{refbegin}}

• {{cite journal | last=Maddison | first=Wayne P. | title=A phylogenetic classification of jumping spiders (Araneae: Salticidae) | journal=The Journal of Arachnology | year=2015 | volume=43 | number=3 | page=231–292 | doi=10.1636/arac-43-03-231-292 | s2cid=85680279}}
• {{cite journal | last=Prószyński | first=Jerzy | year=2017 | title=Pragmatic classification of the World's Salticidae (Araneae) | journal=Ecologica Montenegrina | volume=12 | pages=1–133 | doi=10.37828/em.2017.12.1 | doi-access=free | author-link=Jerzy Prószyński}}
• {{cite journal | last1=Su | first1=K.F. | last2=Meier | first2=R. | last3=Jackson | first3=R.R. | last4=Harland | first4=D.P. | last5=Li | first5=D. | year=2007 | title=Convergent evolution of eye ultrastructure and divergent evolution of vision‐mediated predatory behaviour in jumping spiders| journal=Journal of Evolutionary Biology | volume=20 | number=4 | pages=1478–1489 | doi=10.1111/j.1420-9101.2007.01335.x}}
• {{cite book | last=Thorell | first=Tamerlan | title=On European Spiders, Part 1: Review of the European Genera of Spiders, Preceded by Some Observations on Zoological Nomenclature | location=Uppsala | publisher=E. Berling | year=1869 | oclc=769306868}}
• {{cite journal | last1=Wesołowska | first1=Wanda | last2=Haddad | first2=Charles R. | year=2009 | title=Jumping Spiders (Araneae: Salticidae) of the Ndumo Game Reserve, Maputaland, South Africa | journal=African Invertebrates | volume=50 | number=1 | pages=13–103 | doi=10.5733/afin.050.0102| bibcode=2009AfrIn..50...13W |s2cid=85322962 | doi-access=free | author-link1=Wanda Wesołowska}}
• {{cite journal | last1=Wesołowska | first1=Wanda | last2=Haddad | first2=Charles R. | year=2018 | title=Further additions to the jumping spider fauna of South Africa (Araneae: Salticidae) | journal=Annales Zoologici | volume=68 | number=4 | pages=879–908 | doi=10.3161/00034541ANZ2018.68.4.011 | s2cid=86626109}}
• {{cite journal | last1=Wesołowska | first1=Wanda | last2=Russell-Smith | first2=Anthony | year=2022 | title=Jumping spiders from Ivory Coast collected by J.-C. Ledoux (Araneae, Salticidae) | journal=European Journal of Taxonomy | volume=841 | pages=1–143 | doi=10.5852/ejt.2022.841.1943 | doi-access=free }}
• {{cite journal | last1=Wiśniewski | first1=Konrad | last2=Wesołowska | first2=Wanda | year=2024 | title=Jumping spiders (Salticidae) of Uganda – revised list, new species and distributional data | journal=European Journal of Taxonomy | number=952 | pages=1–171| doi=10.5852/ejt.2024.952.2647 | bibcode=2024EJTax.952....1W| doi-access=free }}

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{{Taxonbar|from=Q2557213}}

Category:Endemic spiders of South Africa

Category:Salticidae

Category:Spiders described in 2009

Category:Taxa named by Wanda Wesołowska