Garden Spider

This is a female Garden Spider ( Araneus diadematus ). Females of this species are considerably larger than the males, sometimes even eating them. This spider eats its web each night, along with all the small flying insects entangled in it. Each morning it spins a new web. When finished, it either lies in wait face down in the web like this, or just outside the web with a single threat attached to its leg. This threat acts as a single, alerting the spider if anything has been caught in the web. This spider was photographed at night, using a Canon speedlite 380 EX.

Boston, Massachusetts

October 4, 2011