Now, time for leaving Europe for an exciting field adventure is coming fast. For the project "What are the Westnearctic Tegenaria? A Phylogeographical Study Investigating the Evolutionary History of the Spider Family Agelenidae". I will travel to Mexico, exploring parts of that impressive country to find the animals in focus – the endemic Tegenaria species. A local friend and scorpion expert will guide me through his country, following the footsteps of famous American arachnologist Willis J. Gertsch and Vince Roth and many other spider collectors.
We hope to rediscover most of those places from where the endemic species had been described (type localities). If we succeed in discovering adult spiders, we will try to catch them and take them with us for detailed morphological examination in the laboratory. Most important, we want to get parts of their genetic code, too. For this reason, we will put parts of the spiders in 100% ethanol and return these samples to our molecular laboratory for DNA extraction.
So, for a good start, lets cross fingers that Air France will not be on strike and that luggage will travel to the right place, too.
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