In southeastern Arizona, a new type of tarantula has been discovered in the Chiricahua Mountains.
A field trip to the mountains by a group of scientists in 2018 led to the discovery of what is being called the Aphonopelma jacobii tarantula.
Brent Hendrixson, a biology professor at Millsaps College in Mississippi, was part of the group.
“It had the coloration. It had these really bright orange hairs on its abdomen. It had kind of this grayish color to it. It just didn't look right to me to be that species. But then, you know, the way that we ended up determining that it was indeed new is that we did all this genetic testing," he said.
Researchers used 20 specimens to diagnose and describe the tarantula.
Hendrixson notes the significance of Chiricahua Mountains for others.
“Scientists have been flocking to the Chiricahua Mountains for decades doing research there. And we thought we had a handle on what was going on down there," he said.
Hendrixson says the finding underscores that there are undiscovered species across the world.
The researchers' findings were published in the scientific journal ZooKeys.
