Largest Spider Fossil Discovered Buried in Volcanic Ash
Posted on April 20, 2011
The largest fossilized spider was discovered buried under volcanic ash in Inner Mongolia, China. The spider belongs to the golden orb weaver family. The spider's 2 centimeter body would not have been the longest, but the spiders legs had a span of 15 centimeters, about six inches. The spider was perfectly preserved when it died around 165 million years ago. It has been named Nephila jurassica.
Professor Paul Selden from the University of Kansas, US. told the BBC, "She is the largest known fossil spider. Her body is not the biggest, but if you add in her long legs then she's the largest."
Some of the arachnids in the orb weaver family living today are also quite large. The Daily Mail has included a photograph of a Golden Orb Weaver eating a bird in its story about the newly discovered fossi.
The research paper about the discovery was published in Biology Letters. You can read the full article here.