Summary of our present knowledge of the spider communities of the Galápagos archipelago. First analysis of the spider communities of the islands Santa Cruz and Isabela

A synthesis is given of 30 years of galapagoan spider fauna research, including an historical overview of spider sampling in the archipelago. A total of 11,437 specimens originating from 688 sampling localities are analyzed. In total 175 spider species are reported of which 152 could be identified or were described as new. The remaining 23 species could only be identified to morpho-species level and they may be new to science and thus endemic. Two basic conclusions could be made from this first analysis of the existing data. 1° Single islands or island groups can be characterized by a specific spider community, and 2° the well-differentiated climax vegetation zones of Isla Santa Cruz can also be characterized by a specific spider community.