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beautiful spider on fancy web
Hello!
I took a picture of this spider in June on Skidaway Island, GA. Its web is amazing, I’ve never come across one of these fellas before and I don’t believe I’ve seen it in your many spiders pages. Some sort of argiope? Any idea?
Anthony

Hi Anthony,
The lable on your JPG file is correct. This is a spider in the genus Argiope. Argiope Spiders are sometimes called Writing Spiders because of the stabilimentum pattern woven into the web. This is thought to be a camouflage device, which is obvious in your image. We checked BugGuide and found a nearly identical image with this information provided by Bob Patterson: “Argiope Spider….. …. probably an immature (based on the stabilamenta pattern in the web), and possibly the species A. aurantia, based on comparison with photos in Thomas Eisner’s fine book ‘For Love of Insects.’ ” So, it would seem you have an immature female Golden Orb Weaver.

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