Alice Springs Fauna •
Alice Springs Spiders > Alice Springs Spider Index
Dolomedes facetus, from the family Pisauridae, is known as the Elegant Water Spider and Crafty Fishing Spider. It is a medium to large-sized fishing spider, endemic to Australia.
They are usually found in freshwater ponds and waterways, ranging from Western Australia to Tasmania, and is common in the northern parts of Australia in Queensland and the Northern Territory.
The Elegant Water Spider pictured here was retrieved from a swimming pool in Alice Springs. It appeared to be quite comfortable skating across the swimming pool. It was retrieved and placed in a fish pond (maybe not the best place to put this spider 😀).
- Scientific classification
- Kingdom: Animalia
- Phylum: Arthropoda
- Subphylum: Chelicerata
- Class: Arachnida
- Order: Araneae
- Infraorder: Araneomorphae
- Family: Pisauridae
- Genus: Dolomedes
- Species: Dolomedes facetus
Footnote & References
- Many thanks for ID to Robert Raven, member of Australian spider identification page, Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/groups/australianspidereducation/
- Dolomedes Latreille, 1804, Atlas of Living Australia, https://bie.ala.org.au/species/https://biodiversity.org.au/afd/taxa/258f5f5c-fc24-405e-aa01-df58d6f31ee8#gallery
- Crafty Fishing Spider (Dolomedes facetus), iNaturalistAU, https://inaturalist.ala.org.au/taxa/368975-Dolomedes-facetus
SpidersIndex of Spider Images Spiders in Australia Spiders Index Araneidae — Orb Weavers Arkys Australian Huntsman Spider Barking Spider Black House Spider Carepalxis sp Celaenia sp Crab Spiders Deinopidae — Net-casting Spiders Dolomedes sp Dolophones sp Flower Spiders Hackled Orbweavers (Uloboridae) Herennia sp Jewel Spider Jumping Spider Long Jawed Spider (Tetragnatha sp) Lynx Spider (Oxyopes) Mangrovia albida Maratus Missulena occatoria (Red-headed Mouse Spider) Miturgidae Nicodamidae (Red and Black Spider) Nyssus coloripes (Orange-legged Swift Spider) Ogre-faced Net-casting Spider Poltys sp (Twig Spider) Redback Spider Scorpion-tailed Spider (Arachnura higginsi) Thomisidae Tiger Spider (Trichonephila plumipes) White-spotted Swift Spider (Nyssus albopunctatus) Wolf Spider