Sunlit Web

@Stephen Phillips: Thanks, Stephen! It was nice to see such a good web over on the side of the trail after brushing their webs from our faces all morning!

@Monique: Thanks, Monique! I believe it may be the same spider or a closely related species over here. They're called Golden Orb Weavers or banana spiders.

@saeed: Thank you very much, Saeed! Cheers!

@Observing: Thanks so much, Mike! We did get a good laugh over this; we had walked down a dead end path by the river, and when we turned around to leave, there it was. This web was almost a meter wide across the trees.

@Monique: Thanks, Monique! We call them Banana Spiders, but their proper name is Golden Orb weaver. There's a photo and a link with more info on them tomorrow.

@linerberry: Thanks, Linerberry! The binomial name of the species is Nephila clavipes, a species of Golden Orb spider. Fully grown, the females have a legspan as big as a man's hand. They can put up webs very quickly, and tend to put them across trails and wide spots. Barry and I usually wave a stick in front of us when we're hiking out somewhere in the dark, they're not fun to have across your face!

@Helen: Thank you very much, Helen!

@Betty: Thanks, Betty! We saw HUNDREDS of mating pairs that morning! It's common to see the females, but the males entering the webs for mating is a once-yearly occurrence. Tomorrow there will be a picture of a pair in a web.