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Spiders of the Eastern US, A Photographic Guide
By W. Mike Howell and Ronald L. Jenkins
pearson education, 2004
ISBN: ISBN 0-536-75853-0
Cite: 13897 with citation markup [cite:13897]
Information about the book you could find at:

http://www.samford.edu/schools/artsci/biology/spiderbk.htm

Error found
An image in the book labeled a female Castianeira amoena is incorrect. See CanadianArachnology.org

Use
this link for Amazon.

The Amazon link doesn't get to this book, at least today.
But you can see more about it, including ordering information, here at the Samford University website.

 
updated link
Publication information now here.

Also, does anybody know details about the error on the photo of Castianeira amoena? The Canadian arachnology link given is no longer live.

 
error
On page 263 the image labeled Castianeira amoena is actually C. gertshi.

 
Might not be C. gertschi?
I've been reading a lot about Castianeira lately to get more familiar with them... C. gertschi doesn't seem to fit to me, at least based on descriptions in (1) (though the diagram in that monograph doesn't match the corresponding text that speaks of the interrupted line, which is weird) and the diagram in (2) (which does match the interrupted line description). The main thing is that the white lines on the posterior half of the abdomen are supposed to be "interrupted at midline" in C. gertschi (so it looks like two dashes, rather than a full line).

I was wondering if the image might actually be C. trilineata instead, but then from reading, that species is only suppose to have two white lines on the front half of the abdomen... which doesn't fit since the one in Howell & Jenkins has what looks like a total of four lines... so I'm not sure what else to suggest as a possibility instead of, or alongside of, C. gertschi. Just thought I would bring it up while this was all fresh in mind.

 
C. gertschi
We might want to consult Kevin on this one. I think the original post said that the author said it was error and the actual ID was C. gertschi. I don't think it was an ID by any of us.

 
C. gertschi
I'll ask what Kevin remembers about it. I think I remember it had originated on the old Nearctic Spider Database (probably at the old link from the top of this page), so knew it wasn't something anyone here had said. Was wondering if anyone else noticed it or if I was just misreading things. If the ID came from the book authors, I wonder if it was a microscope identification... something to ask Kevin, I guess. I typically wouldn't care, (really not a big deal), but I was typing up my own "errata" pages for two field guides and wanted to get the info straight on this mystery. I had scribbled in C. gertschi on that page, but today while trying to learn about some other Castianeira, I came across the actual descriptions & diagrams for C. gertschi that made me question this one.

 
"errata" pages for two field guides
I've been meaning to do the same thing. I need to go through my hard copies and pencil in the corrections I'm aware of ... I'd use pen, but I'm afraid the names may change again. =]

 
No kidding!
As soon as you're used to one name, it changes. I don't know what I would do without the WSC! And I just barely learned how to use it correctly like 7 months ago. I kept using only the database, not realizing how different it is from the actual catalog... I felt sooo silly when I finally figured it out. Suffice it to say, things are lots easier now, haha! (...and they make waaay more sense.) :-P

About the errata pages, I am probably going to post them in the forums at the SpiderIdentification.org website when I'm done, in case you want to check them/use them/confirm/correct, etc. Maybe I'll post them here, too, but I was thinking that the errors in the books I'm doing are pretty obvious to the arachnological folks here already. Over at SpiderId.org, people are a little less experienced than here and use these couple books a lot... Murphy's Law that the exact species that are misidentified in them would be the exact species they see on the site (and misidentify). I'm doing Spiders of the Eastern US and Spiders of the North Woods by Larry Weber. It just doesn't seem fair that people are trying to learn from the material in them, but they're being misled right from the get go in some cases... I feel bad correcting people in the forum when they've correctly used the books but the books were wrong to begin with. In Weber's book, for example, the spider listed as Araneus diadematus is actually what looks like an Araneus gemmoides (if you have this book, you will notice how off it is right away, same thing with all the other errors)... a gnaphosid listed as a Clubiona... Meta ovalis listed as Neoscona arabesca, etc. Some are really obvious, at least to anyone with some spider experience. I know authors (professional or not) all make mistakes, it's only human... but I just want to help the people on the website that are using these books as their sole literature to be able to jot down the corrections and be able to sharpen their skills. I think I'm also going to make a note before the errata list that says not to be afraid to second guess anything you find and to always look for things to corroborate the info. Second and third and fourth opinions are good in spider identification. (Long comment, sorry!)

 
I just got that Spiders of the North Woods
I noticed the Meta right away, but I hadn't even looked at the page with the cat-faced spider. I'll start a list here. If you don't mind I'll probably use your list for any I haven't found like that cat-faced one. Feel free to use mine as well for your list on SpiderID.org. List started here.

 
Awesome
I had all the stuff that was on yours except for the correction on page 146 of Howell & Jenkins (Araneus bonsallae not Araneus guttulatus)... totally over-looked that one. I'm almost done with mine and will update you with a link to it soon. I did find additional stuff that can be added to the list here in BugGuide. I decided I'm also going to include a third field guide in mine - Spiders of the Carolinas, by L.L. Gaddy, which has a few ID errors, as well.

Oh, about the C. gertschi (pg 263) thing... talked to Kevin and it was actually Kevin himself that talked to Howell and suggested that it was C. gertschi. After I've brought it up, Kevin said he re-read some stuff on gertschi & trilineata and said that he doesn't think those can be separated by habitus images alone. So not sure what that image really is of. I just listed both species with question marks in my book.

 
Ah ha...
That clears that up. I'll suggest both on the correction page.

 
and a spelling correction...
I searched the web on C. gertshi, and I believe the species name is misspelled--Encyclopedia of Life lists Castianeira gertschi Kaston, 1945.

 
Castianeira gertschi
Right! Thanks for the correction.

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