Language: English
The family Araneidae is one of the large families in the spider world. The members of this family are known as typical orb-weavers because they spin true orb webs, having geometrical precision and beauty. They prefer to construct their orb-webs in the garden foliages mainly in the rainy season. Some build a retreat at a distance from the webs, others remain at the centre and quietly await their prey. Though the members of this family are abundant in Ubdua, unfortunately scant information is available on Indian forms. Previous authors recorded some species of the family Araneidae (= Argiopidae) from British India but the majority of them had been placed under the genus Araneus. After thorough studies of this group of spiders from India, the authors realized that many species were placed erroneously under the genus Araneus by the previous authors, which consisted of many genera namely Neoscona, Cyrtophora, Leucauge, Singa, Chorizopes. The authors have studied some genera of the Family Araneidae in detail and placed them, as far as possible, according to their respective position. This paper deals with systematic studies of the genera Neoscona and Araneus.
The authors were fortunate enough to have the opportunity to study the types of many orb-weaving spiders which were described by Simon, Pocock and Gravely and are deposited in the Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle, Paris; British Museum (Natural History), London and the National Collection of the Zoological Survey of India, Calcutta, respectively.
The descriptions and illustrations of all known species have been made on the basis of types or authenticated identified female specimens in the author's collections.
The type specimens are deposited in the National Collection of Zoological Survey of India, Calcutta. Other named collection are deposited in the Western Regional Station, Zoological Survey of India, Poona.