JUNGLE LOOK

THE WEEK goes searching for spiders and geckos alongside wildlife researchers in Maharashtra’s Amboli forest

- POOJA BIRAIA

It had been 48 hours since we began looking for the elusive trapdoor spider. Four of us, including scientist Akshay Khandekar, were crouched on the ground littered with dry leaves, staring at a mound of soil under a tree. Silence was key. We were in Amboli forest, a protected reserve in Maharashtra’s Sindhudurg district, some 700m above sea level. This area falls under the jurisdiction of the Sawantwadi Forest Department. Mercury was at 34 degrees Celsius. Sticky heat.

As we closed in on 20 minutes on our haunches, Khandekar inspected the soil under the bark of a tree with his little finger, very lightly, as if caressing a newborn. Nothing happened. We moved on.

In 2020, this was the very spot where Khandekar, 31, discovered the first trapdoor spider species from the Western Ghats. That moment was historic and rewarding, but the search had been frustrating and time-consuming, as it was now. Then, it had taken him three months to find one specimen of the spider—he named it Conothele Ogalei, after his friend and fellow researcher Hemant Ogale.

Khandekar, a field biologist and taxonomist, had read that there are about 35 species of the trapdoor spider spread across south, central and northeast India, but the genus Conothele had never been found in the Western Ghats. He decided he was the man for the job.

But that is the problem with trapdoors; they are not meant to be found. These elusive creatures dig into the ground and, at the entrance of the burrow, build silken-hinged trapdoors. They feed by quickly opening the door and grabbing insects passing by.