Trapdoor spiders of the genus Liphistius are known as "living fossils", due to the little morphological changes over long evolutionary timescales. Unfortunately due to poaching, the populations of this species has been dwindling over the years. More to follow... Liphistius specialises in building camouflaged lids, or trapdoors to their burrow entrances, with radiating tripwires connected to the circumference of the burrow entrance.

Since my photos have been going around on the internet again with a whole bunch of falsehoods, thought I'd share the original shots instead.

This is a Cyclocosmia, a genus of cork-lid trapdoor spiders with a posteriorly truncated abdomen. More shots to follow... Specimen was collected from Thailand and photographed in captivity. But it has been labelled to be from many other countries in central America.

I rarely shoot specimens on white backgrounds, but had some ideas for the book and made a few attempts.