NOTABLE SPIDER RECORDS FOR 1993
Peter Harvey
Introduction
As part of a national survey of spiders being undertaken by the British
Arachnological Society in conjunction with the Biological Records
Centre at Monks Wood, members of the Essex Spider Group are
recording the distribution of spiders in Essex. To date over 35,000
spider records have been made in the county and are held on a
computer database for the Field Club. From 1988 provisional
distribution maps have been produced yearly on a 5Km square basis for
all the species for which there are detailed location and modern records,
using the computer mapping program DMAP written by Dr Alan
Morton. The first set of maps clearly showed the distribution of Essex
arachnologists living and working in the Colchester area and southwest
Essex area! The enormous gaps in recording for the northwest and
centre of the county have been systematically targeted and coverage is
now quite presentable. (See fig).
The main difficulty remaining is to obtain a good coverage of the
various species associated with houses, outhouses and gardens. For
example the house spider Tegenaria gigantea almost certainly occurs in
every house in the county and spiders such as the Garden spider
Araneus diadematus and the Zebra spider Salticus scenicus in just
about every garden or on every fence or wall in the county. I would
ask Field Club members to look at the existing records of these species
and to help if they can. Any spiders found in your house or garden
may represent a new record and I will gladly receive specimens and
refund postage costs.
Another aim of our recording has been to identify sites in the county of
importance for spiders and other invertebrates. A large number of
localities of interest have been found. A number of these sites are
clearly of special importance and it is to be hoped that they can be
afforded special protection and the owners persuaded to continue
suitable management.
Old records for the county mainly comprise those of the Rev. 0.
Pickard-Cambridge (1883-86), F. 0. Pickard-Cambridge (1899-1900)
and Frank P. Smith (1901-2, 1903-4) made in the Epping Forest area
between about 1882 and 1904, together with those of the Flatford Mill
33