Large Spider Webs?

odinn7

Arachnosquire
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My sister talks about when she was driving cross country and she stopped in a camp ground in Oklahoma...She had been warned about large spider webs by some of the people there but didn't pay much attention to them. Anyway, she was on her way walking somewhere at dusk and she walked into this huge spider web that just wrapped around her as she walked through it. She claims it was hung between 2 trees that were 15-20 feet apart. Now, I know she is prone to exaggeration but even so, I got to wondering if there are any spiders that anyone knows of that build webs like these? Any spiders that build large webs?
 

psionix

Arachnobaron
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John Apple said:
Nephila clavipes comes to mind, but in OK.
that was my first thought too but i don't believe they don't range into OK (too far northwest, IIRC)...

i think 15-20' across is probably a slight exageration but it could be some Araneus sp. i've seen their webs 5'+ across. Some Argiope sp. make some pretty big webs too but that's usually in grassy areas, not wooded ones.



did she catch any fish that day? if so, how big were they? ;)
 

odinn7

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psionix said:
did she catch any fish that day? if so, how big were they? ;)
I believe she caught some sunfish that were 27 feet long and weighed 6,000 pounds...she was using ultra-light tackle too...you should've heard about the ones that got away though!
 

Cigarman

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I have seen spiders around a lake here in Maine that run webs from the roof of the camp building all the way to the ground. Thats 12+ feet! The webs were straight down and quite strong. The spiders themselves were gray and looked like a clenched fist when seen from a distance. They had big abdomens and stout legs that weren't very long. We were a little creeped out by them when we saw them but after cleaning them out, we let them go. At first glance they seemed the epitomy of evil but they were just doing what they do. I can't really figure out what species they were but those were some spooky large webs. Some people called them barn spiders but who knows what the technical name is...:?
 

odinn7

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Maybe my sister wasn't too far off then...Anyone else have ideas? This is starting to get interesting.
 

Tarantula

Arachnobaron
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A spider that seldom is mentioned in this kind of threads is Agriope spp. They make very large webs to. Up to 1m in diameter.
 

Stylopidae

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Araneus, maybe?

I know this sounds like I'm pulling stuff out, but last night at the movie theater I caught a mantis.

So I walked around the theater looking for more.

I eventually ended up finding a spiderweb that was stretched somewhere between 10 and 15 feet between two bushes (probably more like 10).

I eventually found the spider, a large araneus species that was almost an inch across the abdomen.
 

swade655

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Rescued 2 Agriopes from a barge on the mississippi river that was being cut up for scrap, the webs of both started 14 feet up the barge hopper wall all the way to the bottom of the center of the barge, an easy 15+ feet
 
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