''Araniella opisthographa'' is a species of

orb weaver Orb-weaver spiders are members of the spider family Araneidae. They are the most common group of builders of spiral wheel-shaped webs often found in gardens, fields, and forests. The English word "orb" can mean "circular", hence the English name ...

in the

spider Spiders ( order Araneae) are air-breathing arthropods that have eight legs, chelicerae with fangs generally able to inject venom, and spinnerets that extrude silk. They are the largest order of arachnids and rank seventh in total species ...

family

Araneidae Orb-weaver spiders are members of the spider family Araneidae. They are the most common group of builders of spiral wheel-shaped webs often found in gardens, fields, and forests. The English word "orb" can mean "circular", hence the English name ...

Distribution

This species can be found widely throughout

Central Europe Central Europe is an area of Europe between Western Europe and Eastern Europe, based on a common historical, social and cultural identity. The Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) between Catholicism and Protestantism significantly shaped the area' ...

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...

Caucasus The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, mainly comprising Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and parts of Southern Russia. The Caucasus Mountains, including the Greater Caucasus range, have historically ...

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

and in parts of

Central Asia Central Asia, also known as Middle Asia, is a subregion, region of Asia that stretches from the Caspian Sea in the west to western China and Mongolia in the east, and from Afghanistan and Iran in the south to Russia in the north. It includes t ...

including

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

.NMBE World Spider Catalog

Habitat

These spiders usually occurs on trees (especially oaks), bushes in woodland, scrub and hedgerows and herbaceous environments. They prefer moderately dry to dry deciduous and coniferous forests.Spiders of Europe
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Description

''Araniella opisthographa'' can reach a body length of about in males, of about in females. The cephalothorax (

prosoma The cephalothorax, also called prosoma in some groups, is a tagma of various arthropods, comprising the head and the thorax fused together, as distinct from the abdomen behind. (The terms ''prosoma'' and ''opisthosoma'' are equivalent to ''cepha ...

) varies from yellow to red-brown, usually with broad dark marginal bands in males. The abdomen (

opisthosoma The opisthosoma is the posterior part of the body in some arthropods, behind the prosoma (cephalothorax). It is a distinctive feature of the subphylum Chelicerata (arachnids, horseshoe crabs and others). Although it is similar in most respects to a ...

) is definitely shiny yellowish green on top, with four black small depressions in the middle and five pairs of black lateral spots. On the lower end of the abdomen there is a red mark. At the extremities of the pedipalps, males have the copulatory organs. Legs are yellow or red-brown. In males they are red and black ringed and femurs show several strong bristles along the whole length. This species is very similar to '' Araniella cucurbitina'', that shows only 1-4 pairs of black lateral spots on abdomen.

Biology

Adults can be found from March to October.iNaturalist
The nets have a diameter of about ten centimeters and are laid diagonally to horizontally, usually at a height of about three meters. The females usually sit in the middle of the net.

Gallery

File: Araniella_opisthographa_m_080514.jpg, ''Araniella opisthographa''. Male File: Araniella opisthographa w 080514.jpg, Underside of a female with a captured weevil File: Araniella Opisthographa.jpg, ''A. opisthographa''

Bibliography

*Levy, G. (1987). Spiders of the genera Araniella, Zygiella, Zilla and Mangora (Araneae, Araneidae) from Israel, with notes on Metellina species from Lebanon. Zoologica Scripta 16(3): 243-257. doi:10.1111/j.1463-6409.1987.tb00071.x *Locket, G. H., Millidge, A. F. & Merrett, P. (1974). British Spiders, Volume III. Ray Society, London, 315 pp. *Melero, V. X. & Anadón, A. (2002). Segunda cita para la Península Ibérica de Araniella opistographa (Kulczynski, 1905) (Araneae, Araneidae). Revista Ibérica de Aracnología 6: 169-172. *Ransy, M. (1987). Les problemes d'identification du genre Araniella (Araneidae). Nieuwsbrief van de Belgische Arachnologische Vereniging 4: 25-28 *Spasojevic, T., Kropf, C., Nentwig, W. & Lasut, L. (2016). Combining morphology, DNA sequences, and morphometrics: revising closely related species in the orb-weaving spider genus Araniella (Araneae, Araneidae). Zootaxa 4111(4): 448-470. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.4111.4.6 *Zamani, A., Marusik, Y. M. & Šestáková, A. (2020). On Araniella and Neoscona (Araneae, Araneidae) of the Caucasus, Middle East and Central Asia. ZooKeys 906: 13-40. doi:10.3897/zookeys.906.47978

References

Araniella Spiders described in 1905 Taxa named by Władysław Kulczyński Spiders of Europe {{araneidae-stub