Argiope aemula spider of Malaysi

Familia: Araneidae
Subfamilia: Argiopinae
Genus: Argiope
Species: Argiope aemula

Family : Araneidae, Orb-Web Spiders.
Habitat: Low shrubs beside hiking trails at the fringe of primary and secondary forests.
Female: 25-30 mm. Male: 5-8 mm.
Distribution: Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand , the Philippines, Borneo Island , Papua New Guinea, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, India, Taiwan, China, Southern Japan, Northern Australia.

SEMARAK VEGETABLE GARDEN 21 JUNE 2009 SUN 2:26PM
Semarak Vegetable Garden is 0.5 kilometer to the bank of lower Tawau River (Sungai Tawau)

Gossamer - The extremely fine silk that spiders use for ballooning
Small and young spiders are known using silk threads for ballooning in dispersal to another location.

But this fully grown adult male Argiope aemula also use ballooning to escape from the photographer.

A female can reach the size of 30mm, the male grew up to only about 1cm and small and light enough to ballooning into the air.

As seen in these images, this male extrude a long bunch of several threads into the air and let itself be carried away by winds.

The extremely fine silk that spiders use for ballooning is known as gossamer.