Arachnid observations by Pehr Kalm during his journey to North America (1748-51)

Abstract

<p>Pehr Kalm (1716-79) was a professor at the Royal Academy of Turku (Åbo) in Finland, belonging at that time to Sweden. Carl Linnaeus organized a research journey to North America where Kalm's base was near Philadelphia. He made two long, demanding and dangerous journeys to Canada and to the Niagara Falls. Kalm's main focus was on plants and their economic use, but he observed and collected all kinds of nature items, including arachnids. Kalm described and named five spider species in his travelogue. His species are, however, not valid due to their pre-Linnean descriptive names. Kalm also mentioned false scorpions, harvestman and several mite species. He described and named a tick in 1754, which Linnaeus named, based on Kalm's data, in 1758 as Acarus americanus (now in Amblyomma), the well-known Lone star tick.</p>