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Southern House Spider
Juan Cruzado Cortés, CC BY-SA 4.0, via iNaturalist

Spiders & tarantulas

Southern House Spider

Kukulcania hibernalis (Hentz, 1842)

Names

EnglishSouthern House Spider
Dutch—
SpanishAraña de patio
Chinese寒库蛛
Sranan Tongoanansi (general name for the group)
Scientific nameKukulcania hibernalis (Hentz, 1842)

About this species

The southern house spider is a species of large spider in the family Filistatidae. Currently given the scientific name Kukulcania hibernalis, it was formerly known as Filistata hibernalis. Found in the Americas, it exhibits strong sexual dimorphism. It lives in the southern states of the USA, throughout Central America and some of the Caribbean, to southern Brazil, Uruguay and Argentina. The males may be mistaken for brown recluse because the two have similar coloration and body structure. However, compared to the brown recluse, male southern house spiders are often larger in size, lack the distinctive violin shape on their cephalothorax, and have unusually long slender pedipalps. The females are dark brown or black and more compact. Both genders may grow to be roughly 2 inches (5.1 cm) across (legs extended), with the males typically having longer legs, and the females often having larger, bulbous bodies. The abdomen of the southern house spider is covered with fine velvety light gray hair.

Read more on Wikipedia · Text: Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0

Classification

KingdomAnimalia
PhylumArthropoda
ClassArachnida
OrderAraneae
FamilyFilistatidae
GenusKukulcania