Habronattus
americanus, male
This is a guide to the jumping spiders of Canada and the United States (excluding Hawaii). Here are some of the pages available:
List of genera. This page lists all genera in North America north
of Mexico, organized according to a provisional arrangement of subfamilies.
In the list, you can click on the genus name to go to a page concerning
that genus.
A photo album of genera. Basically, the same list of genera but
with photos.
Organized by microhabitat. Here is a quick photo album of the
genera of jumping spiders in Canada and U.S.A. organized by the microhabitat
(e.g. foliage, tree trunks, ground) in which they tend to live.
This guide is not independent from the world-wide treatment of the Salticidae section of the Tree of Life. In fact, the guide to North America is basically a series of links to sections of the Tree that pertain to North American salticids. As you wander through this guide, you will likely soon find yourself having wandered outside of North America to the salticids as a whole.
In case you are curious about jumpings spiders around the world, go to the Salticid Gallery. Jumping spiders are easily distinguished from other spiders by their four big eyes on the face and four smaller eyes on top of the head. Jumping spiders make up the family Salticidae. Around the world there are probably more than 5000 species of jumping spiders, of which a few hundred occur in North America north of Mexico.
Comments on this guide are welcome, both on the biology and the presentation. It is still under construction and is incomplete. The text is sparse and incomplete, and this guide is therefore not much more than a photo album at present. Things to be added include keys to the genera and species, and a guide to the salticids expected in different microhabitats. The contents of this guide are NOT to be considered a publication for the purposes of taxonomic nomenclature! New combinations and synonymies have been avoided, but if any are implied, treat them as if they are unpublished.
Acknowledgments
Given that the photographs shown here were taken over the course of about 20 years, the various sources of assistance have become too numerous to list. Most prominent is the collecting assistance of David Maddison.
The photographs were digitized with the assistance of Cora Varas. A David and Lucile Packard Foundation Fellowship provided financial support.
