Have you ever woken up on a fall morning and noticed the dewy grass and bushes littered with spider webs? I don’t mean the beautiful geometric-patterned webs of the orb-weaving spiders, but webs that appear to be nothing more than loosely woven sheets of spider silk. Normally I don’t give them a second glance, but one morning this weekend I stopped and looked at one of them more closely.
Close-up of web in the grass
I discovered a beautiful little world, filled with tiny beads of water, captured by the threads of the web. I think the spider is a grass spider of the genus Agelenopsis. Wikipedia notes that the webs of grass spiders are not sticky, but the spiders makes up for that by being able to run really quickly.
Here is a view of an entire web through a telephoto lens. I was on a walkway several feet above ground-level when I took the shots, so I was not able to get actual close-up shots. The photo is not a very good one, but it gives you an idea of how nondescript the web looked at first glance.
Web in the grass
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Mike Powell 
Mike,
I have noticed! And I, too, have photographed some of these. My discovery was that many if the ones I saw were wide funnels, and the hole in the center led to a hole in the ground… About as big around as an average finger, so pretty big. I haven’t had time yet to hang around and watch something (presumably) emerge from the hole, but it’s a fascinating world!
Thanks for sharing your sparkly photo 🙂
Kyle
Glad to see that I am not the only one who looks at things like this. I’ve read about the funnels and will try to check them out the next time.