Arachnophobes may want to brace themselves for this haunting news.
In the depths of a Missouri forest in the United states of America, a humongous spiderweb was discovered by a conservationist. He claimed it looked “big enough to catch humans.”
The Missouri Department of Conservation’s employee stumbled upon the web as he was out on a routine trail in Springfield. He immediately clicked a photo which the department shared on their official Facebook Page.
With Halloween around the corner, the web had a spooky effect on most of those who viewed the image. One user commented, “I'd freak out seeing this, knowing there is a spider the size of my hand nearby *shudders*.” Others had funnier reactions like, “Gorgeous piece from an architect of nature .. until you run into it!”
One user asked to add a trigger warning next time, while another said, “Awesome! But a sad comment on our society that my first thought was that it was beautiful until some a-hole comes along and destroys it.”
According to the department, the gorgeously scary web is the work of an orb weaver spider. The intricately designed circular web hanging between two trees is not as big as it looks in the picture. The web is only slightly larger than average, however, the camera angle and strategic light makes it look impossibly large.
The Missouri Department of Conservation didn’t want to alert unsuspecting viewers who might assume the web was actually human-sized. In the caption, they explicitly state that the actual web might be the size of a dinner or slightly larger. They elaborated on how such webs are “most noticeable in late summer in fall” as this is the time when adults of this spider species are at their largest size.
According to their website, the orb-weaver family of spiders are known so because of the circular webs they weave. Their work can definitely be compared to that of a weaver with such intricate designs. There are many species that fall under this family, almost all are hairy, fairly large, but ultimately harmless to humans.
Their web, despite what the conservationist claimed, is only designed to catch insects or other smaller spiders. In fact, these spiders are a natural way to keep insect populations under control.