TAXONOMY AND PHYLOGENETICS OF NANOMETINAE AND OTHER AUSTRALASIAN ORB-WEAVING SPIDERS (ARANEAE: TETRAGNATHIDAE)

The spider family Tetragnathidae Menge is a cosmopolitan, relatively well-studied spider clade with some members readily identifiable by their elongate chelicerae and/or their horizontal orb webs. It has four recognized subfamilies-Tetragnathinae, Metainae, Leucauginae, and the Australasian endemic Nanometinae-although many genera remain unassigned to subfamilial groups. Nanometinae alpha taxonomy is the least well understood of these lineages despite the inclusion of members of the subfamily in a number of phylogenetic analyses over the past decade. Here we describe 10 new species and revise seven additional tetragnathids from Australia, New Zealand, New Caledonia, and Papua New Guinea in the genera Nanometa, Taraire, gen. nov., Tawhai, gen. nov., Harlanethis, gen. nov., and Iamarra, gen. nov. These 17 species are: Nanometa gentilis Simon, 1908, N. trivittata (Keyserling, 1887), comb. nov., N. sarasini (Berland, 1924), comb. nov., N. lagenifera (Urquhart, 1888), comb. nov., N. purpurapunctata (Urquhart, 1889), comb. nov., N. fea, sp. nov., N. tasmaniensis, sp. nov., N. tetracaena, sp. nov., N. dimitrovi, sp. nov., N. dutrorum, sp. nov., N. forsteri, sp. nov., Taraire rufolineata (Urquhart, 1889), comb. nov., Taraire oculta, sp. nov., Tawhai arborea (Urquhart, 1891), comb. nov., Harlanethis lipscombae, sp. nov., H. weintrauborum, sp. nov., and Iamarra multitheca, sp. nov. We also synonymize Nediphya Marusik and Omelko, 2017, and the monotypic genus Eryciniolia Strand, 1912, with Nanometa, bringing the total number of species in the genus from one to 14. Using an expanded taxon sampling for prior studies based on six molecular markers-12S rRNA, 16S rRNA, 18S rRNA, 28S rRNA, cytochrome c oxidase subunit I, and histone H3-and both maximum likelihood and Bayesian methods, we place these taxa in the tetragnathid tree of life. Nanometinae and its constituent genera Nanometa and Pinkfloydia are reciprocally monophyletic. Harlanethis belongs to Leucauginae. The genera Taraire, Tawhai, and Iamarra defy robust phylogenetic placement and are not yet assigned to subfamily.