Funnel weavers catch prey on webs that are not sticky at all
That flat sheet of silk draped over a hedge, with a tunnel leading into shadow, belongs to a funnel weaver. The web has no glue. It works by tangling and by vibration, and its owner is among the fastest spiders known. The giant house spider once held the world record.
Funnel weavers make up the family Agelenidae, which counted 100 genera and 1,694 species as of January 2026, including North America's grass spiders. Most have bodies between about 4 and 20 millimetres long, though some, such as Eratigena atrica, span up to 10 centimetres across the legs. They have eight eyes set in two rows of four and oval abdomens usually marked with two rows of lines and spots. They are unrelated to the dangerous funnel-web spiders of Australia, which belong to a different group entirely.
The hunting method is simple and effective. The spider spins a flat, springy sheet with a funnel-shaped retreat at one side and keeps adding loose threads whenever it walks across. Those filaments snag on the tiniest bump of an insect's leg. When a grasshopper drops onto the sheet, the spider feels the struggle, dashes out, delivers a paralysing bite, and drags the meal back into its tunnel. Scientists have studied the venom of one species, Agelenopsis aperta, in detail.
Speed matters to this approach. The giant house spider was clocked at 0.53 metres per second and held the Guinness record for spider speed until 1987. Good eyesight lets these spiders flee when a large shadow passes over, and some sense moving air. Females make better ambushers; males wander more, and in September outdoor species often shelter around windowsills and porch doors.
A few African relatives go further. Agelena consociata lives in colonies that share webs, hunt together and raise young communally, though unlike ants or bees they have no worker castes and every female can breed. Fossil funnel weavers have also turned up in Eocene Baltic amber.
Source: Agelenidae
