April 23, 2012

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Spiders in Borneo: Thank you Sarawak

By Wayne Maddison

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This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American

In our last few days in Borneo, Edy and I gave a public lecture at the Sarawak Biodiversity Centre, a research institute that specializes on bioprospecting potential pharmaceuticals from forest plants and other organisms, using both traditional knowledge and high-tech testing methods. It's an impressive facility from a scientific perspective. I was so pleased to have the opportunity to tell the public directly about what we found. If I have any regret about this trip, it's not finding more opportunities to tell the people of Sarawak about the great spiders they have. Well, the Internet and lots of photos will eventually solve that.

It's time to say our thank-you's for the expedition, and sign off. The Sarawak Forestry Department and the staff at Gunung Mulu, Lambir Hills, Kubah, and Bako National Parks offered their collaboration through permits and logistics, which made the entire expedition possible. The infrastructure available to us at our field sites was excellent. At Mulu, where we concentrated our sampling, our work was made considerably easier by the assistance offered us by Brian Clark, Jeremy Clark, and the other park staff. Andyson Laman was a great guide on our Camp 1 foray. Our work was made more fun by our chats with Syria Lejau Malang and Magdalena Sorger, though with the latter I will have to disagree about the beauty of salticids versus ants. Especially ants that bite.

Ch'ien Lee helped us arrange the expedition in the first place, and introduced us to the Bornean forest. I would like to thank most especially Alex Ang, who took a month off of his normal life in Kuching to accompany us into the forest. Alex made an important contribution to our success. I also can't forget a big thank you to NSERC Canada, for the funding that enabled this expedition.

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Sarawak was good to us in many ways. It was easy to get around, safe, with friendly people. We found professionalism, cleanliness and good organization everywhere.

Finally, and you might have seen this coming, I'd like to thank the spiders. I can't individually thank all 175 species of jumping spiders that I estimate we found in Sarawak, but I will show you some of their faces. As you look at these, think about my previous post about the music of biodiversity, about variations on a theme. And, remember the eyes. That's how you know it's a jumping spider.

And to you humans out there, thanks for following our expedition. Next time, look back at a jumping spider when she looks up at you.

Previously in this series:

Spiders in Borneo: Introduction

Spiders in Borneo: Undiscovered biodiversity

Spiders in Borneo: The guests of honor: Salticidae

Spiders in Borneo: Team Salticid

Spiders in Borneo: Mulu National Park

Spiders in Borneo: Dreaming about salticid spiders

Spiders in Borneo: Jumping spiders in the forest

Spiders in Borneo: Beating around the bushes

Spiders in Borneo: Spiders in leaf litter

Spiders in Borneo: A Vertical Life

Spiders in Borneo: Leeches and eyeballs

Spiders in Borneo: What I carry

Spiders in Borneo: Breaking News!

Spiders in Borneo: Falling from above

Spiders in Borneo: Entangled and pierced

Spiders in Borneo: Scattered literature

Spiders in Borneo: Mulu wrap-up

Spiders in Borneo: Lambir Hills

Spiders in Borneo: Replaying the Tape of Life

Spiders in Borneo: More Hispo at Lambir

Spiders in Borneo: Geometrical Jumping spiders

Spiders in Borneo: Trees that grow from sky to ground

Spiders in Borneo: The spiders who wouldn’t be

Spiders in Borneo: The Music of Biodiversity

Spiders in Borneo: Jumping spider rainbow

Spiders in Borneo: Top ten animal encounters

Spiders in Borneo: Time traveller

Text and images © W. Maddison, under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license (CC-BY)

Wayne Maddison is a biologist who studies the diversity and evolution of jumping spiders. When he was thirteen years old in Canada, a big jumping spider looked up at him with her big dark eyes, and he's been hooked ever since. Jumping spiders hunt like cats, creeping and pouncing, and the males perform amazing dances to females. His fascination with the many species of jumping spiders led to an interest in their evolutionary relationships, and then to methods for analyzing evolutionary history. He received a PhD from Harvard University. He is now a Professor at the University of British Columbia, and the Scientific Director of the Beaty Biodiversity Museum. He has taken it as his mission to travel to poorly known rainforests to document the many still-unknown species before they are gone, and to study them and preserve them in museums for future generations.

More by Wayne Maddison

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