Thousands of spiders build giant web

Updated 22.27 Fri Aug 31 2007

Keywords: Texas, spiders

Thousands of spiders have spun a giant web, the size of two football fields, in a park in Texas.

Park wardens discovered the phenomenon earlier this month. The web covered several trees and shrubs in the Hunts County Park, east Texas.

The huge framework, which stretches 180 metres, has attracted visitors from across the world

The huge framework, which stretches 180 metres, has attracted visitors from across the world.

When the web was first spun it was clean and white but rainfall and thousands of dead insects caught in the sticky mass, have left it dirty and emitting an strong rotting smell.

Officials at the park are unsure whether the web was made by social cob web spiders or was an act of mass dispersal, where the arachnids spin webs to get away from each other.

The web is expected to last until this autumn, when the spiders begin dying off.