Multi-Coloured St. Andrew's Cross Spider (1b - Ventral)
Family: Araneidae (Orb-Weaver Spiders)
Species: Argiope versicolor (Doleschall, 1859)
Location: Singapore Quarry
This female is missing a 1st leg in the right lateral. The zig-zag pattern of dense silk on the web is a cruciform stabilimenta.
Size of cruciform stabilimenta showed a curvilinear relation to spider body length; the fitted curve for “total segment length” had a maximum at an intermediate spider length. This relationship (among other phenomena) supports an apparently-larger-size hypothesis, whereby medium-sized spiders in particular appear much larger than they actually are. This could discourage predators, including those that are gape-limited such as lizards.
Source: "Stabilimenta characteristics of the spider Argiope argentata on small islands: support of the predator-defense hypothesis" by Thomas W. Schoener, David A. Spiller