Urupelma

Urupelma is a recently established genus of Andean tarantulas in the family Theraphosidae. It was created in 2023 by Kaderka, Lüddecke, Řezáč, Řezáčová & Hüsser during a major revision of the Peruvian species Homoeomma peruvianum. Their work showed that this spider and several related montane taxa did not fit the diagnostic characters of Homoeomma, especially in male palpal bulb structure and female spermathecae, so they were moved into a new genus, Urupelma.

The type species is Urupelma peruvianum (originally described as Hemirrhagus peruvianus by Chamberlin in 1916, later placed in Homoeomma before being reassigned to Urupelma). The genus name combines “Urubamba” (after Peru’s Urubamba River and region, also interpreted in Quechua as “plateau of spiders”) with the Greek pélma (“sole of the foot”), reflecting both the spiders’ Andean origin and their robust tarsi.

Today, Urupelma includes multiple small to medium-sized, ground-dwelling species restricted to high-elevation regions of Peru, where they inhabit mossy and shrubby montane habitats. Ongoing work on Andean theraphosids continues to refine the exact species list and placements within this young genus, so hobby and scientific names may still change as new data are published.

For interested readers: Kaderka et al. 2022/2023.

Genus and species: Urupelma peruvianum

Common name: Peru Mountain Dwarf

Given name: Nestle

Sex: Undetermined

Life stage: Sub-adult

This is a terrestrial species from the Andean highlands that reaches approximately 4 inches as an adult. This species has a brown to dusky body with a contrasting lighter/rufous carapace and abdomen setae.

Habitat: Andean highlands; found under rocks.

Specimen Notes:

• Approximately 2 inches in length