Every year at about this time I start looking for Yellow and Black Garden Spiders. Argiope aurantia is named in honor of the naiad nymph Argiope, who, according to Greek mythology, lived in the mountains and may have been associated with mountain streams—Argiope means "of the silver face" and this may refer to silvery water. In spider terms, it probably refers to the creature's silvery face, something observers may not notice, since their attention is drawn first to the stunning black and yellow abdomen. Argiope first emerges from an egg sack in spring, but the spiderlings are too small to spot. By late summer, however, the few that have survived—they're a favorite prey of mud-dauber wasps—are big enough to construct very visible webs. These are classics: masterpieces of spider architecture. Usually, I'll spot the stabilimentum—that thick, white, wavy zig-zag below the spider—first, and this tells me to have my camera ready to capture the webmaster.Garden spider