The structure, which covers 106 square meters, was built by a colony of more than 111 thousand spiders of two different species.
An international team of scientists and explorers has discovered what could be the largest spider web ever recorded. The discovery was made in the so-called Sulfur Cave, located on the border between Greece and Albania, where a colony of more than 111,000 spiders built a web that covers around 106 square meters.
Revealed in a study published on October 17th in , the web is described as a funnel-shaped structure made up of thousands of intertwined threadsforming a continuous network that stretches along the wall of a narrow cave corridor.
For researchers, this is not only a record in size, but also the first known evidence of colonial behavior between two common spider species.
“It is the first known evidence of colonial behavior in two common species and, most likely, represents the largest spider web in the world,” said István Urák, associate professor of Biology at the Hungarian Sapientia University of Transylvania, in Romania.
Teia is in a difficult to access location
The Sulfur Cave It is a difficult to access and permanently dark placeformed by the oxidation of hydrogen sulfide present in groundwater. It was there that, In 2022, cavers from the Czech Speleological Society observed the enormous web for the first time during an expedition to the Vromoner Canyon. Two years later, a team of scientists returned to the site to collect samples and begin an in-depth study.
As analyzes identified two dominant species: Tegenaria domestica (the so-called house or barn spider) and Prinerigone vagans. It is estimated that there are around 69 thousand copies of the first and more than 42 thousand of the second.
Although both are common in human environments, Cooperation between different species in building and sharing the same web has never before been recorded.
“This colony is a unique case of two species coexisting in the same tissue structure and in such high numbers”, highlighted Urák in statements to the Live Science portal.
“It is essential to preserve this community, despite the challenges inherent to its location between two countries,” he added.
