Asia

There is currently only one accepted species in this genus. Muller (2024) described this species in a comprehensive publication. Source: Muller 2024 Source: Muller 2024 Aspinochilus rufus Common name: Often sold as the Peach Earth Tiger or Rufus Earth Tiger tarantula. Origin: An Old World arboreal species endemic to Java, Indonesia, specifically montane rainforest habitats. Lifestyle: Arboreal tarantula that will also make use of burrows or deep retreats, heavily webbing it

Cyriopagopus  is a Southeast Asian tarantula genus first described by French arachnologist Eugène Simon in 1887, with Cyriopagopus paganus  designated as the type species. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, closely related Asian tarantulas were split among several genera, including Selenocosmia , Haplopelma , Melopoeus , Lampropelma , and Omothymus . As more material was studied, it became clear that many of these taxa were very similar, and their boundaries were poor

Haplocosmia  is a small genus of Old World tarantulas in the subfamily Selenocosmiinae, first described by Schmidt & von Wirth in 1996. These spiders are native to the southern slopes of the Himalayas and surrounding regions, where they inhabit cool, montane forests in Nepal, northern India, and Tibet. The genus currently contains three recognized species: Haplocosmia himalayana  – from the Indian Himalayas Haplocosmia nepalensis  – the type species from Nepal Haplocosmia she

Lampropelma  is a small genus of arboreal tarantulas in the subfamily Ornithoctoninae, native to the Indonesian island region of Southeast Asia. It was erected in 1892 by French arachnologist Eugène Simon for Lampropelma nigerrimum  from Sulawesi, and has always been a geographically restricted, island-endemic group within the family Theraphosidae. For many years, several striking Asian arboreal tarantulas – including the well-known “Singapore Blue” – were placed in Lampropel

Lyrognathus is a small genus of Old World tarantulas from South and Southeast Asia, first described by British arachnologist Reginald Innes Pocock in 1895. He based the genus on the species Lyrognathus crotalus from India, which is still the type species today. Over the next century, a few more species were added, including L. saltator from India and L. robustus from Malaysia. Some names were later cleaned up: for example, Lyrognathus pugnax  and L. liewi  are now considered

Magnacrus  is a newly established genus of Old World tarantulas in the subfamily Ornithoctoninae, formally described in 2025 by Hoang, Yu, Wendt, West & von Wirth. The genus was created after a detailed revision of Asian stout-leg earth tigers showed that Citharognathus tongmianensis  (Zhu, Li & Song, 2002) did not belong in Citharognathus ; this species was transferred and re-described as Magnacrus tongmianensis , becoming the type species. At the same time, a second species

Omothymus is a small genus of large, arboreal tarantulas from Southeast Asia, currently containing four recognized species: O. schioedtei, O. violaceopes, O. fuchsi, and O. rafni. The genus was first established in 1891 by Tamerlan Thorell, based on the Malaysian species Omothymus schioedtei . In 1903, Eugène Simon sank Omothymus into synonymy with Cyriopagopus , and for more than a century these spiders were generally treated under that name. Modern work on arboreal Asian ta

The subfamily Ornithoctoninae was erected in 1895 to house a distinctive group of Southeast Asian tarantulas with strong burrowing habits, powerful chelicerae and a characteristic stridulating organ (sound-producing hairs) between the jaws and palps. These features, combined with their Asian distribution, separate them from the similar African Harpactirinae. Between the late 1800s and early 1900s, most of the “classic” genera were described: Ornithoctonus  (Pocock, 1892) – th

Ornithoctonus  is a small genus of Southeast Asian tarantulas first described in 1892 by British arachnologist Reginald Innes Pocock, based on specimens from the Mergui Archipelago region of Myanmar. The type species, Ornithoctonus andersoni , helped define not only the genus but later the entire subfamily Ornithoctoninae, which Pocock formally erected a few years later in 1895. Through the 20th century several species were added and later moved out of Ornithoctonus  as taxon

Orphnaecus is a small genus of Old World tarantulas first described by Eugène Simon in 1892. Endemic to the Philippines, these spiders belong to the subfamily Selenocosmiinae and are best known for their robust bodies, fossorial lifestyle, and a distinctive patch of lance-shaped stridulatory spines on the chelicerae, which they use to produce sound. For more than a century, Orphnaecus was represented only by the type species O. pellitus. In 2012, a major revision of Asian the

Phormingochilus  is an Old World arboreal tarantula genus first described in 1895 by British arachnologist Reginald Innes Pocock, based on specimens from the rainforests of Borneo. He designated Phormingochilus everetti  as the type species and also described P. tigrinus  in the same work, establishing the group within what we now recognize as subfamily Ornithoctoninae. For much of the 20th century the genus was poorly known, with only a handful of Bornean species recorded. M

History of Selenocosmia 1871 – Genus erected Austrian arachnologist Anton Ausserer establishes the genus Selenocosmia  within Theraphosidae, with Mygale javanensis  (Walckenaer, 1837) designated as the type species (now Selenocosmia javanensis ). Early work (late 1800s–early 1900s) Classic arachnologists like Thorell, Kulczyński, Hogg, Simon, and others describe many of the “core” species from Indonesia, New Guinea, India, and Australia (e.g. S. crassipes , S. stirlingi , S.

Selenobrachys is a small genus of Old World tarantulas in the family Theraphosidae, native to the Philippines. It was first established in 1999 by Günter Schmidt to accommodate Selenobrachys philippinus  from Negros Island, a bright orange terrestrial species that quickly became popular in the hobby. In 2012, a major revision of Asian tarantulas treated Selenobrachys as a junior synonym of the genus Orphnaecus , so S. philippinus  was referred to for years as Orphnaecus phili

Selenocosmiinae is an Old World tarantula subfamily (family Theraphosidae) found from India across Southeast Asia to New Guinea and Australia. It was first established by Eugène Simon in 1889 based on a group of burrowing mygalomorphs that shared distinctive stridulatory (“hissing”) organs: a lyra of stiff hairs on the maxillae and corresponding strikers on the chelicerae. Early work in the late 19th and early 20th century described many of the core genera we still recognize