Orb-weaver Spider

Description:

Araneae; Araneidae; Neoscona; Neoscona molemensis Tikader & Bal, 1981. Many spiders in the Genus: Neoscona can be difficult to identify. Wikipedia explains - "There are large variations in the dorsal patterns and coloration of the abdomen, even in a single species......Neoscona can be difficult to distinguish from species of Araneus without close examination of the carapace." However, there are very many pictures of Neoscona molemensis which can be viewed on-line and that makes identification much easier.

Habitat:

This spider was spotted at 8:22 am today in our backyard. It was on the topmost leaf of a young Great Bougainvillea (Bougainvillea spectabilis). On a young Bougainvillea plant, the top few leaves are red and change to green as the plant matures. This N. molemensis was the second one I spotted today, just a few metres away from and a few minutes after the spider in https://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/13....

Notes:

Plant identification - http://www.stuartxchange.org/Bogambilya Photos - https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/819426-...