SMALL ORB-WEAVERS OF THE GENUS ARANEUS NORTH OF MEXICO (ARANEAE: ARANEIDAE) HERBERT W. LEVI Abstract. The small species of Araneus include the genera and subgenera Amamrotijpm, Cam-bridgepeira, Conaranea, Mimaranea and Conepeira of Archer. There are altogether 31 species north of Mexico. Many of the species are rare in collections, presumably because they are forest species that make their webs in tree-crowns. Most larger collec-tions come from mud dauber wasp nests. The dis-tribution of the small species in general is eastern and southern North America, in contrast to the northern distribution of the larger species. Many species, as in theridiids, show a cline with the largest specimens in the North, the smallest in Florida. A correction is made to the previous study on the genus Neoscona and additional information presented on several large species of Araneus. While meadows, "old field communities," shrubs, herbaceous layers of forests, and leaf litter have been well collected in many parts of North America, the spider fauna of the forest canopy remains largely un-known. Foliage of forest tree-crowns prob-ably is the habitat of numerous small species of Araneus. Despite the possible economic importance of predators high up in trees, the scant knowledge we have of this habitat appears mostly in the European literature. This probably explains why the number of specimens available for this revision has been small. I gratefully acknowledge the cooperation of my colleagues in entomology, Howard E. Evans and Robert W. Matthews, whose helpful wasps did most of the collecting, presumably high up, and delivered the spiders to the nest traps from which they were conveniently harvested. Without their assistance, insuflBcient material would have been available to sort out the species. Other collections were made available by J. Beatty, D. Bixler, W. J. Gertsch, J. A. L. Cooke and V. D. Roth of the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH*), Cornell University, and Utah University collections. J. E. Carico, R. E. Crabill of the U.S. National Museum, C. Dondale of the Canadian National Collections, Ottawa, R. Leech, B. J. Kaston, K. V. Krombein, F. E. Kurczewski, P. Miliotis, W. Wayne Moss of the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, W. Peck of the Exline-Peck collection. Miss Susan Riechert, W. A. Shear, J. A. Sheals, D. Clark and F. R. Wanless of the British Museum (Natural History), Karl Stone, B. Vogel, H. K. Wal-lace (HKW) and H. W. Weems of the Florida State Collection of Arthropods (FSC). Next to the American Museum, the Museum of Comparative Zoology (MCZ) has the largest collections of these small Araneus species. Peter van Hels-dingen and W. Shear contributed ideas throughout; E. Mayr advised on compli-cated nomenclatural matters. Also, I would like to thank Ann Moreton for living speci-mens and photographs. This investigation was supported in part by PubHc Health Service Research Grant AI-01944 and by a grant from the National Science Founda-tion GB-36161. * For rare species I have given the initials of the collection in the text. Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., 145(9): 473-552, December, 1973 473
BioStor
