New Species of Eight-Eyed Monster Spider Discovered in Abandoned Mexico Mine

Mine spiders are spiders that live in caves, tunnels, or mines, often in dark and humid environments. Some of them are venomous and can cause serious harm to humans – the sting of some can even prove fatal. Recently, a new species of mine spiders has been discovered in an abandoned mine in Mexico, and with its eight beady eyes, thick fang-like structures, inch-long hairy body, and legs spanning four inches across, it pretty much looks like something out of a horror movie.

The new spider was found by a team of researchers from the San Diego Natural History Museum, who were exploring the Sierra Cacachilas, a small mountain range in Baja California Sur. They noticed a huge exoskeleton hanging from the ceiling of a cave, and decided to return at night, when the spider would be more active. They were amazed to see a spider with a body roughly the size of a softball.

Image credit: phorsley
The researchers collected eight specimens of the spider and sent them to Maria Luisa Jimenez, an expert on Baja spiders from the Centro de Investigaciones Biológicas del Noroeste. She confirmed that the spider was not only a new species, but also a new genus, meaning that it was very different from other related spiders. She named it Califorctenus cacachilensis, after the mountain range where it was found.

The researchers collected eight specimens from different locations, including an abandoned mine shaft and a pit toilet. Jimenez said that she had never seen a spider this large in her years of collecting spiders on the peninsula.

The newly discovered species has a coffee brown head and legs, and a yellow abdomen with some iridescence. It has visible fangs, but its bite is not fatal to humans, unlike that of its cousin, the Brazilian Wandering Spider, one of the deadliest spiders in the world, whose venom can cause severe muscle paralysis and respiratory failure, ultimately leading to death.