''Seycellesa'' is a genus of spiders in the family

Theridiidae Theridiidae, also known as the tangle-web spiders, cobweb spiders and comb-footed spiders, is a large family of Araneomorphae, araneomorph spiders first described by Carl Jakob Sundevall in 1833. This diverse, globally distributed family includes ...

. It consists of only its

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen ...

: ''Seycellesa braueri'', which is

endangered An endangered species is a species that is very likely to become extinct in the near future, either worldwide or in a particular political jurisdiction. Endangered species may be at risk due to factors such as habitat loss, poaching and inva ...

and

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

to the

Seychelles Seychelles (, ; ), officially the Republic of Seychelles (french: link=no, République des Seychelles; Creole: ''La Repiblik Sesel''), is an archipelagic state consisting of 115 islands in the Indian Ocean. Its capital and largest city, V ...

Taxonomic history

The

was initially described in 1898 by the French naturalist

Eugène Simon Eugène Louis Simon (; 30 April 1848 – 17 November 1924) was a French naturalist who worked particularly on insects and spiders, but also on birds and plants. He is by far the most prolific spider taxonomist in history, describing over 4, ...

, who placed it in the genus '' Theridion''. He chose the

specific epithet In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

''braueri'' to honor A. Brauer at the University of Marburg. His description was based on a male specimen. British arachnologist Michael Roberts described a

junior synonym The Botanical and Zoological Codes of nomenclature treat the concept of synonymy differently. * In botanical nomenclature, a synonym is a scientific name that applies to a taxon that (now) goes by a different scientific name. For example, Linna ...

, ''T. purifum'', in 1978. The specific name was described as "an arbitrary combination of letters". His description was based on a female specimen. Michael Saaristo synonymized ''T. purifum'' with ''T. braueri'' in 1999. In 2006, Saaristo

circumscribed In geometry, the circumscribed circle or circumcircle of a polygon is a circle that passes through all the vertices of the polygon. The center of this circle is called the circumcenter and its radius is called the circumradius. Not every polyg ...

a new genus for ''T. braueri''. He named it ''Robertia'' after Michael Roberts. However, that generic name was

invalid Invalid may refer to: * Patient, a sick person * one who is confined to home or bed because of illness, disability or injury (sometimes considered a politically incorrect term) * .invalid, a top-level Internet domain not intended for real use As t ...

due to a senior homonym: the synapsid genus '' Robertia''. In 2008, Ahmet Koçak and Muhabbet Kemal created a

nomen novum In biological nomenclature, a ''nomen novum'' (Latin for "new name"), new replacement name (or replacement name, new substitute name, substitute name) is a scientific name that is created specifically to replace another scientific name, but only w ...

for this genus: ''Seycellesa''.

Distribution

''S. braueri'' is

to the

, where it is found on the islands of Mahé and Silhouette at elevations of . The type locality for ''S. braueri'' is Mahé; the type locality for the junior synonym ''S. purifum'' is Morne Seychellois, central Mahé. Its habitat is

woodland A woodland () is, in the broad sense, land covered with trees, or in a narrow sense, synonymous with wood (or in the U.S., the ''plurale tantum'' woods), a low-density forest forming open habitats with plenty of sunlight and limited shade (see ...

Species description

The total length of the female ''S. braueri'' is ; males are smaller, with a length of . The

carapace A carapace is a Dorsum (biology), dorsal (upper) section of the exoskeleton or shell in a number of animal groups, including arthropods, such as crustaceans and arachnids, as well as vertebrates, such as turtles and tortoises. In turtles and tor ...

is yellow-orange in color and has a dark border and marking along its median. The color of the chelicerae,

maxillae The maxilla (plural: ''maxillae'' ) in vertebrates is the upper fixed (not fixed in Neopterygii) bone of the jaw formed from the fusion of two maxillary bones. In humans, the upper jaw includes the hard palate in the front of the mouth. The t ...

, labium, and sternum is black-tinted yellow. The

opisthosoma The opisthosoma is the posterior part of the body in some arthropods, behind the prosoma (cephalothorax). It is a distinctive feature of the subphylum Chelicerata (arachnids, horseshoe crabs and others). Although it is similar in most respects to a ...

is spherical and the chelicerae have two anterior teeth.

Conservation status

The

IUCN Red List The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, also known as the IUCN Red List or Red Data Book, founded in 1964, is the world's most comprehensive inventory of the global conservation status of biol ...

considers ''S. braueri'' to be

. Its habitat is deteriorating due to

invasive Invasive may refer to: *Invasive (medical) procedure *Invasive species *Invasive observation, especially in reference to surveillance *Invasively progressive spread of disease from one organ in the body to another, especially in reference to cancer ...

plants like '' Cinnamomum verum''. Its extent of occurrence is and its area of occupancy is .

References

{{taxonbar, from=Q18460540, from2=Q2114563, from3=Q45191289, from4=Q5302414 Theridiidae Monotypic Araneomorphae genera Spiders of Africa Spiders of Seychelles Endemic fauna of Seychelles