''Argyrodes flavescens'', commonly called the red and silver dewdrop spider is a species of

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 ...

belonging to the family

Theridiidae Theridiidae, also known as the tangle-web spiders, cobweb spiders and comb-footed spiders, is a large family of Araneomorphae, araneomorph spiders first described by Carl Jakob Sundevall in 1833. This diverse, globally distributed family includes ...

. It is widely distributed in

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, south-eastern region of Asia, consistin ...

and is also found in

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

. Like other members of this genus, this species is a kleptoparasite, living on the

web Web most often refers to: * Spider web, a silken structure created by the animal * World Wide Web or the Web, an Internet-based hypertext system Web, WEB, or the Web may also refer to: Computing * WEB, a literate programming system created by ...

of a larger spider and feeding off its prey. ''A. flavescens'' most commonly inhabits the webs of araneids. This is a very small spider with a length (excluding legs) of around 3 mm. The legs are black and the markedly domed and very shiny

abdomen The abdomen (colloquially called the belly, tummy, midriff, tucky or stomach) is the part of the body between the thorax (chest) and pelvis, in humans and in other vertebrates. The abdomen is the front part of the abdominal segment of the torso. ...

is red-brown with white spots. File:Argyrodes flavescens at Nayikayam Thattu.jpg, ''Argyrodes flavescens'' on the web of an ''

Argiope pulchella ''Argiope pulchella'' is a species of the orb-weaver spider family, Araneidae. It ranges from India to China and can be found on Java. It is a synanthropic species, often living in habitats associated with humans. Description The female is lar ...

References

* (2009)
The world spider catalog
version 9.5. ''American Museum of Natural History''. Spiders of Africa Spiders of Asia Theridiidae Spiders described in 1880 {{Theridiidae-stub