Today's Newly Described Species Worldwide

Public

Newly registered plant / animal / microbial species in WoRMS / GBIF / Zoological Record each day, with discovery location, describer, morphological description, and whether the species is under extinction threat

Daily at 12:00 PM

Today's Newly Described Species Worldwide05/24/2026, 10:13:28 AM

4 new nudibranchs named in a global Flabellinidae revision: a new genus for a Philippine sea goddess, and three striped deep-sea species from the Sea of Okhotsk

A compressed ~12.5-hour Sunday window (23–24 May 2026) yielded a single taxonomic harvest: four new nudibranch species and one new genus (*Launsina*, named for the Philippine sea goddess) from a global PLOS One revision of family Flabellinidae. *Launsina tanyae* comes from 20 m depth off Nha Trang, Vietnam, vivid in pink-purple with orange cerata. Three new *Mgueolia* — *M. vladimiri*, *M. anastasiae*, and *M. ninae* — were collected at 221 m in the Sea of Okhotsk's Diana Strait, each distinguished by coloration and radular tooth morphology.

Today's Newly Described Species Worldwide05/24/2026, 01:29:20 AM

11 new species named May 22–23: a Texas mosasaur twice the length of a great white shark, a tree in its own new genus from Cretaceous France, and an Endangered Colombian cannonball-tree relative

A ~28.5-hour Saturday window (22–23 May 2026) yielded 11 confirmed new species — 3 animals, 5 plants, and 3 microorganisms — from seven journal sources. Headliners: Tylosaurus rex (Campanian Texas, 7.7–13.2 m, serrated teeth, the largest tylosaurine known), Acutodon villeveyracensis (new genus, France, pushes pan-shinisaurid lizards in Europe back ~30 million years to the Cretaceous), Gustavia caucana (Endangered cannonball-tree relative from Colombia's Cauca riparian forests), and Ingrithrix praediumpetri (new genus of cyanobacterium producing far-red chlorophylls d and f above 700 nm).

Today's Newly Described Species Worldwide05/23/2026, 01:34:37 AM

42 new species named May 21–22: three Himalayan pit vipers, a deep-sea copepod in its own new family, a critically endangered Vietnamese gesneriad, and eight Andean dung beetles

A ~28-hour window (21–22 May 2026) yielded 42 confirmed new species from seven journal sources. Highlights: three pit vipers split from the long-misidentified Gloydius himalayanus complex (Pakistan/Nepal), a single deep-sea copepod from 2,537 m that broke Monstrilloida’s 100-year single-family status, eight metallic dung beetles from Andean Colombia and Venezuela, a Vietnamese rock herb assessed Critically Endangered with fewer than 20 known plants, and a color-shifting mushroom with a purple-to-brown cap.

Today's Newly Described Species Worldwide05/22/2026, 02:00:39 AM

22 new species named May 20–21: a moth named for E.O. Wilson, sixteen chafer beetles at once, three Amazon catfish, and a fungus from panda dung

In a ~27-hour window spanning 20–21 May 2026, taxonomists formally described 22 confirmed new species — the bulk from Zootaxa 5814(2) published 21 May, supplemented by a Mucor fungus isolated from giant-panda feces (Current Microbiology, 20 May). The session's standout paper delivered 16 chafer beetles of the Neoserica calva group in a single publication, all from China and mainland Southeast Asia; the window also yielded a water strider that had been misidentified for over a century, a geometrid moth named for E.O. Wilson, a mushroom-eating dung beetle from Zimbabwe's Chimanimani Mountains, and three new Amazon catfish diagnosed by colour pattern and DNA barcoding.

Today's Newly Described Species Worldwide05/21/2026, 02:51:52 AM

26 new species named May 19–20: two Cape Verde snails, a cliff-top rhododendron, a whale-fall worm, and seventeen arthropods

In a 29-hour window spanning 19–20 May 2026, taxonomists formally described or registered 26 confirmed new species — 8 plants across Chile, Ethiopia, Mexico, China, and Peru; 1 fungus from Pakistan; 2 marine gastropods from Cape Verde; a scale worm living on a 75-year-old whale skeleton 1,240 m beneath the Pacific; and 15 arthropods including 5 island-endemic stick insects from Japan's Ryukyus, 4 spiders from the Caucasus and Brazil, 2 rove beetles from a Sulawesi national park, and 4 digger wasps from China. Two species carry author-proposed threat assessments (Peperomia mucronulata, Critically Endangered; Euphorbia leleensis, Endangered); one carries a formal preliminary assessment (Sedum umbraculiforme, Vulnerable).

Today's Newly Described Species Worldwide05/20/2026, 01:45:30 AM

20 new species named May 18–19: a smiling Himalayan spider, two hidden reef doctors, and water bears from Vietnam

Between 18 and 19 May 2026, taxonomists formally described or registered 20 new species across five kingdoms — led by Theridion himalayana, a polymorphic Himalayan spider with 32 colour morphs that independently evolved the same smiling face pattern as a Hawaiian cousin 8,000 km away. Other highlights include two overlooked cleaner wrasse species, a fossorial snake from Mizoram, a new leafhopper genus from Chinese waxberry trees, three fungi, and four microscopic water bears from Vietnam.

Today's Newly Described Species Worldwide05/19/2026, 01:11:05 AM

Five species named this week: a venomous Singapore jellyfish, an Indian leopard gecko, Spanish cave isopods, and Chinese moths

Between May 15 and 18, 2026, taxonomists formally described five new species: Chironex blakangmati (a box jellyfish from Singapore), Eublepharis jhuma (a leopard gecko from Bihar, India), two prominent moths Benbowia uncusplana and B. motuoensis from China, and the new cave-isopod genus Iberoscia with I. zaragozai from eastern Spain. Each entry covers taxonomy, locality, describer, morphology, and conservation status.

Today's Newly Described Species Worldwide05/15/2026, 04:42:53 PM

35 New Species Named in 24 Hours: May 14–15, 2026

In a 24-hour window on May 14–15, 2026, taxonomists formally registered 35 new species across arthropods, marine invertebrates, cave fish, fungi, and plants — drawn from Zootaxa, MycoKeys, and WoRMS. Twenty species covered in depth with locality, describer, morphology, and IUCN status.

No more Drops