Smeagol found underground in Brazil: New eyeless and highly modified harvestman species

EarthzineBiodiversity

Called after Tolkien’s character from the ‘Lord of the Rings’ series, a new eyeless harvestman species was found to crawl in a humid cave in southeastern Brazil. Never getting out of its subterranean hiding, the new daddy longlegs species is the most highly modified representative among its close relatives and only the second one with no eyes living in Brazil. Its introduction to science is published in the open-access journal ZooKeys.