REDESCRIPTION OF CHE IRA CAN THIUM MILDEI 
L. KOCH, A RECENT SPIDER IMMIGRANT 
FROM EUROPE 
By Elizabeth B. Bryant 
Museum of Comparative Zoology 
The fauna of New England has often been compared to 
that of Great Britain, which has about the same area. Dr. 
B. J. Kaston in his recent book, “The Spiders of Connecti- 
cut”, 1948, states that 644 species of spiders have been 
recognized in New England, and that 72 of these are 
common to Europe. Some are endemic, but others have 
been introduced by commerce. In the summer of 1949, a 
spider carrying a cocoon of eggs and new to our fauna, 
was brought to the museum by Dr. A. M. Chickering. It 
proved to be Cheiracanthium mildei L. Koch, a species 
native to southern Europe. 
The genus is known in Europe by 34 species and pre- 
viously in North America by only one, Cheiracanthium in- 
clusum (Hentz), found from New England south to Florida 
and the islands of the Caribbean. Cheiracanthium mildei 
was first described from Meran, Dalmatia, in 1864. It has 
subsequently been reported from Switzerland, Hungary, 
the Caucasus and Palestine. Since 1949, when the female 
mentioned above was recognized, additional specimens of 
both sexes have been found in Connecticut and New York, 
indicating that the species is established in our area. 
I wish to express here my thanks to Dr. W. J. Gertsch, 
of the American Museum of Natural History, to whom we 
are indebted for the gift of a pair of this species taken at 
New Rochelle, New York, June, 1947. 
Cheiracanthium mildei L. Koch 
Figures 1-3 
Cheiracanthium mildei L. Koch, 1864, p. 144. “ $ $ in 
sudlichen Tirol (Meran) in Dalmatien, (Sammlung des 
Herrn Grafen Keyserling) ”. 
120 
