1st time seeing this

[grassroots]

In Ventura County, CA (where a new undisclosed species of spider was recently found) this was in my bathroom, on the wall, at 10:00 PM.

I've never seen a spider like this before, curious if this is that NEW species recently found in the area?

Spider had thin legs with what looked like spots on them. The head and body contained weird markings also.

[Mandy]

Welcome to the forum, grassroots!

This appears to be an adult male "Pirate Spider" in the family Mimetidae, though I'm afraid a detailed exam under a microscope would be needed to identify which genus and species it belongs to. Hey cool, I hadn't heard about a new species in CA! I tried to google news articles about new spiders in CA, but couldn't find anything recent. Where'd you hear about it? There are actually brand new species being discovered all the time and tons of species that just haven't been formally described and given a name yet, so even though various media *occasionally* report on a new find to the public, there are actually a lot more that arachnologists are working on. (Back in 2005 alone, there were 10 undescribed species of pirate spider.)

"Pirate spiders" are really cool... but without a microscope and your specimen in hand, there's no way to tell if this is the new species you mentioned, or something no one has collected before, or just a common species in that area, sorry!

Aha, found what else I was looking for! Our other staff member here, "Bug Eric," wrote a great blog post about pirate spiders, if you're interested in more info: http://bugeric.blogspot.com/2011/09/...e-spiders.html

[grassroots]

Thank you so much for the quick reply!!!

Here's the article of the new discovery written in our local paper:
http://www.vcstar.com/news/2012/mar/...-discovered-in

[Mandy]

Happy to help!

...and, oh! Turns out I did know about that spider, just didn't know there had been any articles written on it yet! Rick Vetter is actually kind of a mentor to me and we've talked about this cool discovery of his in the past. My lips are sealed since his paper hasn't been published yet, but I can say with 100% certainty that your spider is not the species he found.

[grassroots]

Looking forward to finding out what the new discovery is.

The "pirate spider" is definitely pretty cool. I later noticed that there was a Callobius (guessing from other pictures posted on the forum) on the ceiling above it. I wonder who was stalking whom?

Thanks again!

[Mandy]

The paper should be published sometime this year is what Rick said, but I'm not sure which journal it will be in.

Happy to help! I love spiders so it's really no sweat.

It probably wasn't a Callobius on your ceiling (they aren't household spiders and usually live out under rocks and wet logs), but it's not important... I'm just sort of OCD so was compelled to say that! haha