Female Nephila komaci, the hugest webweaving spider.

The Nephila komaci can be found in Madagascar and South Africa.
They can be up to three feet (one meter) wide and are a member
of the orbweaving spiders' group.

"In the PLoS ONE paper, Kuntner and Coddington described Nephila komaci
as a new species, now the largest web-spinning species known, and placed
it on the evolutionary tree of Nephila". (EurekAlert)


(Photos M. Kuntner)
1) a giant golden orb-web exceeding 1 meter in diameter: Nephila inaurata,
Rodrigues, Indian Ocean.
2) extreme sexual size dimorphism in Nephila spiders: Small male and large
female, Nephila pilipes, Singapore.
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Jumping now to another site, EarthTouch, for a beautiful video, taken early
in the morning, when the sun rays make the web's threads shine like gold,
which explains the spider's name.

Golden orb-web spider - Moremi Game Reserve, Okavango Delta, Botswana.

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* Previous post on Golden orb spider.