Giant Crab Spider or Huntsman Spider from Ecuador: Sadala species perhaps

Subject: Ecuadorian Crab Spider
Location: Ecuadorian Amazonia
May 23, 2012 4:47 pm
Last year I posted an image of this species looking for an identification. In April I was back in Ecuadorian Amazonia and I spotted another of these beautiful orange spiders with bluish legs. My guide, a Shuar indian, said it was a crab spider. This was one of your answers in 2011. I was able to capture the eyes this time.
Signature: John R. Anderson

Hi John,
We will link to your original posting.  We decided to do some additional research.  First we located this YouTube video identified as being in the family Sparassidae, the Giant Crab Spiders.  Then we located this photo on FlickR identified as a Wandering Spider in the family Ctenidae.  Then we found this FlickR image identified as a Giant Crab Spider in the genus Sadala, and finally, we found the same photo with the same identification on FlickRiver as part of the Bigal River Conservation Project in Northeast Ecuador. 

Daniel,
Did you reach a conclusion?
One problem in the jungle is the lack of good reference materials. An anima’ls name could be passed from one guide to the next (or one generation to the next) with no way to verify the knowledge. When one uses a term like “wandering spider” it seems very general.
In the end, this is one of the most beautiful spiders I have ever encountered. Just curious.
Thanks,
John R. Anderson

Hi again John,
We are more inclined to speculate that it is the Giant Crab Spider or Huntsman Spider family Sparassidae.  As far as verifying the genus Sadala goes, both sources can be traced to the same original so there is no verification.  In our opinion, you should seek assistance from an expert if you want to confirm any identification.

Karl provides some information
Hi Daniel and John:
Since this lovely spider has made another appearance on your site I felt compelled to give it another go. It is not difficult to find images of this spider on the internet but finding information that is useful for identification purposes has proven to be very frustrating. In addition to the three possible families that have already been mentioned in this and the previous post I also found one site with two photos that looked like they were probably of the same spider, but suggesting it was a Running Crab Spider (Philodromidae). I chose to ignore it and pressed on. I eventually came up with genus Olios, a Huntsman Spider in the family Sparassidae (by the way the eyes in this second posting do look like Sparassidae to me). You can check out online photos identified as Olios sp. here, here, and here. I found several others as well but I was having trouble with the hyperlinks. I checked out several spider lists for Ecuador and it appears that there are two species of Olios in Ecuador, O. corallinus and O. niveomaculatus, but I could find no photos or useful information for either. Until you get confirmation from a real expert, I hope this helps more than it confuses.  Regards.  Karl

Thanks for your research Karl.