Blattodea
Creators: name: Zamani, Alireza
name: West, Rick C.
name: Lamar, William W.
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2024
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Blattodea

description: Termites (Blattodea: Isoptera)
There are a few records of associations between tarantulas and termites in the literature. LourenÇo (1978) reported that Acanthoscurria paulensis Mello-Leitão, 1923 (sub A. atrox Vellard, 1924) inhabits the mounds of an unidentified species of Armitermes Wasmann, 1897 (Nasutitermitidae), while its diet primarily consists of orthopterans and small spiders and vertebrates. Canning et al. (2014) found that some individuals of the Seychelles endemic Nesiergus insulanus Simon, 1903 (Ischnocolinae) construct their retreats within arboreal and terrestrial termitaria (Figure 9A–F) and feed on termites as a part of their diet. Chomphuphuang et al. (2017) reported that some individuals of Phlogiellus longipalpus Chomphuphuang et al., 2017 were found in their retreats built in colonies of ants and termites, which were preyed upon by the tarantulas. The holotype and the only known specimen of Umbyquyra gurleyi Sherwood and Gabriel, 2020 (Theraphosinae) was collected from termite mounds (Sherwood and Gabriel 2020), and Cifuentes and Bertani (2022) listed a female specimen of Psalmopoeus pulcher Petrunkevitch, 1925 collected off a termitarium in San José Island, Panama. Inhabitation of termite mounds has been further reported for Acanthoscurria gomesiana Mello-Leitão, 1923 and an unidentified species of Acanthoscurria Ausserer, 1871 in Brazil (Costa et al. 2009; Macedo et al. 2021), as well as an unidentified species of Selenocosmiinae in Indonesia (Hood et al. 2020).
Herein, we also report on a few observations of theraphosids living in association with termites (Table 3). These include one observation of Avicularia juruensis Mello-Leitão, 1923 from Peru (Figure 8A), one observation of Vitalius dubius (Mello-Leitão, 1923) and two observations of Nhandu coloratovillosus (Schmidt, 1998) (both Theraphosinae) from Brazil (Figure 8B–D), one observation of Psalmopoeus cambridgei Pocock, 1895 from the West Indies (Figure 8E), one observation of Psalmopoeus pulcher from Panama, and one observation of an unidentified species of Brachionopus Pocock, 1897 and one observation of Harpactira marksi Purcell, 1902 (both Harpactirinae) from South Africa (Figure 8F).
Most, if not all, of these associations are likely not mutualistic, given that termite alates and workers are typically preyed upon by the spider and its young. Indeed, the use of termite mounds as retreats is common for a large number of vertebrate and invertebrate species (eg Haddad and Dippenaar-Schoeman 2002; Costa and Vanin 2010; Duleba and Ferreira 2014). Nonetheless, we opted to include them in the manuscript owing to their prevalence and the poorly understood dynamics of these interactions. Termitaria may be chosen by certain theraphosids as an optimal retreat due to prey availability for the young and the stability of the burrow itself.
description: Published as part of Zamani, Alireza, West, Rick C. & Lamar, William W., 2024, An extensive review of mutualistic and similar ecological associations involving tarantulas (Araneae: Theraphosidae), with a new hypothesis on the evolution of their hirsuteness, pp. 1107-1143 in Journal of Natural History 58 (29 - 32) on pages 1130-1132, DOI: 10.1080/00222933.2024.2382404, http://zenodo.org/record/13758139