Timeline for What spider is this? BOLIVIA

Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0

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Feb 1, 2018 at 18:13	comment	added	John Robinson		The interesting thing to me about this photo, and thanks for the question, Melanie, is that we would expect to see this sort of congregation around a light source for night-hunting spiders, like the usual Araneid orbweavers. Argiopes, in North America, at least, are mainly day-hunting spiders - which may be a factor in their practice of making those center stabilimenta in the webs. You wouldn't expect a light source to be all that important to spiders that operate their snares in the daytime. Perhaps something else is going on, or perhaps these spiders have learned that night is better.
Feb 1, 2018 at 18:09	comment	added	John Robinson		The normal reason for finding lots of relatively solitary spiders in an area is that there's lots of food there. Anywhere near a light source is a good place for flying insects, depending on the surrounding area. I've seen closely packed webs on a lighted bridge over a canal, for instance. There needs to be some sort of support structure as well, for the spiders to anchor the webs to; the photo is fuzzy enough that whatever is there is hard to see, but I would assume a wire fence or some other wire structure serves as the base that the webs are attached to at the top.
Jan 31, 2018 at 5:22	comment	added	Melanie Shebel		What’s with them hanging out in numbers like that?
Jan 29, 2018 at 14:19	history	edited	John Robinson	CC BY-SA 3.0	added a more official citation for provisional ID as A. argentata.
Jan 24, 2018 at 0:12	comment	added	theforestecologist♦		Again, thanks for your expertise in spiders, John, but please provide support and provide citations for images (preferably those from reputable sites that properly ID the species you include). Thanks!
Jan 23, 2018 at 20:31	history	answered	John Robinson	CC BY-SA 3.0