While giving a tour in the Ecuadorian Amazon, Alex Bently identified a clump on a leaf as a dead spider parasitized by a Cordyceps fungus. When it moved under his touch, he realized that it was actually a unique case of mimicry, and worked with David Ricardo Díaz Guevara and Nadine Dupérré to describe it as a new species. In this episode, Alex shares the unique nature of this spider, as well as what we can learn from it about the complex relationships that can occur between fungi and other organisms. 

Alex Bently’s paper “The Cordyceps spider”: Taczanowskia waska sp. nov. (Araneae: Araneidae), a new spider species and a novel case of mimicry of an araneopathogenic fungus (Cordycipitaceae: Gibellula)” is in volume 5760 of Zootaxa.

It can be found here: www.doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5760.5.4

Photo Credit: David Ricardo Díaz Guevara

Listen to an interview with Alex’s coauthor David in spanish on New Species Español - https://open.spotify.com/episode/1YZuyGcLva6hK752ueXOtZ?si=6qj-Ru2hTwSpMnVLsTpGwA

A transcript of this episode can be found here: Alex Bently - Transcript

New Species: Taczanowskia waska

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Some neat press coverage of this new species:

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/spider-mimicing-cordyceps-9.7141687

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/20/science/spider-cordyceps-fungus-zombies.html

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Music in this podcast is "No More (Instrumental)," by HaTom (https://fanlink.to/HaTom)

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