ARACHNIDA > OPILIONES > Phalangiidae > Dicranopalpinae

Dicranopalpus larvatus is a new species with the first accepted British record coming from Cornwall in January 2020. Today, as I write this nearly three years on, there are only fifteen confirmed sightings. I know there have been more, but those are the official figures according to the 'Spider and Harvestman Recording Scheme'. The species is known in Europe and is now being regularly found on the Channel Islands, but here on the mainland it is still considered as rare.

It's a particularly interesting species for me as it was the very first harvestmen that I ever photographed. That was in March 2021 and, of course at that time, I had no idea what it was so posted a photo on the UK Harvestmen (Opiliones) FB Group and was obviously somewhat dumbstruck to find that it was a rare species and that my sighting was only the eleventh record of the species. It was a chance discovery in the back garden whilst looking for springtails. I assumed it was a one off, but have recently found more of them, so I guess that Dicranopalpus larvatus is a lot more common than records imply.

The pedipalps are similar to those previously described for Dicranopalpus ramosus, but the species is much smaller at around 3mm body length rather than up to 6mm, and has shorter legs. Notwithstanding the size though, they are best distinguished by their colour and markings; the female typically being mottled cream and red-brown (although that description doesn't quite fit the bill with the first individual I photographed, which is considerably darker), and the male with a mottled chocolate brown cephalothorax and abdomen separated by a distinct pale cream band. Both sexes have a predominantly black ocularium, which in the males is surrounded by a black mask. They also have a dark spot under each coxa, but I have to admit that's not a feature that I've been able to see.

There is limited data regarding habitat preferences, as the few records to date have been from both coastal and inland sites, ranging from gardens and cemeteries to woodland and managed grassland.  Within these areas they have been found in leaf-litter or under stones and deadwood or, in the case of one sighting, on low vegetation. There don't appear to be any yet from house walls where you often find Dicranopalpus ramosus, which is perhaps a little odd, but from other records, presumably from Europe, it is stated that they do not rest with their legs spread out at the side as the two other Dicranopalpus species. That maybe the case, but when I found a little group of six on the side of a broken flowerpot, two of the males were sitting with their legs outstretched, albeit in a looser arrangement rather than tight together, but still an interesting observation.

From information currently available, it appears that Dicranopalpus larvatus is a late season, autumn and winter species.

For reference, all of the following photos were taken in our semi-rural back garden. The first individual I photographed (photo 3) was under a rotting log, another was on some loose bark that I'd propped up against a cut stump, and the rest, apart from one on the garden waste bin, were all on a broken piece of flowerpot that I'd also stood up alongside the same stump in order to cover a rotting potato that I was trying to use to attract a particular species of millipede.