From the Natural History Museum:
Rising from the ashes of the wastebasket taxon, 49 Bowie spiders have been reclassified from Ctenus. Other species, meanwhile, have had previously unknown sex morphs described for the first time.
In addition, Peter has described 55 entirely new species, whose names draw on David Bowie's musical catalogue.
Species from the most northerly areas where the Bowie spiders live, such as Nepal, are named after songs from earlier in the musician's career such as B. ziggystardust and B. majortom.
Those from the central range represent songs from later in his career, such as B. letsdance and B. magicdance, while those from the most southerly areas, such as Papua New Guinea, are named after more recent songs such as B. blackstar.
And yes, there is a B. heroes and a B. aladdinsane and a B. rebelrebel as well. Because I know you were worried about that. I assume the B. magicdance can only be found in goblin labyrinths, but I can't find any information to confirm or deny that.
Researcher Peter Jäger had previously named some other spiders after Bowie as well, including the huntsman spider Heteropoda davidbowie — but this new genus is a whole family of spiders, not just one individual.
New group of spiders named after David Bowie and his back catalogue [James Ashworth / Natural History Museum]
Bowie gen. nov., a diverse lineage of ground-dwelling spiders occurring from the Himalayas to Papua New Guinea and northern Australia (Araneae: Ctenidae: Cteninae) [Peter Jäger / Zootaxa]
Image: Zleng / Flickr (CC-BY-SA 2.0)
