Man, these things are annoying. I think I live in an area where they really started taking off, because I've seen them the last two or three summers. It seems like they are more and more every year. They make huge webs (like up to 6 ft huge, with single webs going out even further) right at or above eye level and then just sit in the middle of them. When hiking or biking trails you have to constantly keep an eye out for them or you'll constantly be walking into them.
I pruned trees in Kununurra, Northern Australia, and there was a spider in each tree we’d cut (500/day). Harmless or not, they tend to climb once they’re on you, so those of us who are afraid of spiders would just let them climb and shook our hats while proceeding to the next tree. Yes, climb across the face. The leader didn’t bother, so spiders would fight on his hat.
Awesome experience, but a few people harmed during the summer, mostly because of the tools (and one by bees, one by green caterpillars, one by dehydration after going to work by 40°C after a night drinking - so basically all their faults as long as you value yourself). Said boss had prison experience. I tend to believe Gen Y misses the year of military service and tend to replace it with similar experiences, and the gap year in Australia is toughening for the office monkey and the nerds we were. 100% would do it again.
You'd be disappointed. Orb weavers see quite poorly, and rely on their webs as their primary sensory modality for perceiving their surroundings. This is why they spend so little time off the web, and also why male spiders pursue such slow and painstaking courtships, plucking the web with enormous care to ensure their prospective partner recognizes their approach rather than mistaking them for prey.
Sounds reminiscent of banana spiders here in Florida -- aka golden orb weaver or golden silk spider. They do the same thing with their webs, which can also be hard to see due to the coloring. (The "golden" is due to the silk's yellow color, not the spider's.)
"The study found that despite their similarities, the Joro spider has about double the metabolism of its relative, has a 77% higher heart rate and can survive a brief freeze that kills off many of its cousins. These findings mean the Joro spider’s body functions better than its relative in a cold environment.
And that means the Joros can likely exist beyond the borders of the Southeast."
Huh. I have those around and didn't even know they bit. Had one living in my screened patio a week or so ago, but I think it finally figured out that it wasn't going to catch much there...
Like most spiders they tend to avoid humans. But if your chore growing up is to clean up all the rotting oranges you're going to be in their territory a bit and the bites are really uncomfortable.
The worst part was the pain would last a few hours.
Your description helped me realize these are the spiders I was constantly dodging on trails outside of Puerto Vallarta last year! The webs were usually over my head on the trails, but I imagine that's only because of trail usage.
Those might have been banana spiders / golden orb weavers, which are native to the southeast US down to northern South America. They have the same web-building habit as described.
As someone from near Kentucky, I hate Banana spiders. They aren’t mean, but they are terrifying if you’re scared of spiders and unlike the spiders in the OP they will bite.
Edit: There's a pretty good example picture of the webs in the UGA article mentioned by the main article: https://news.uga.edu/joro-spiders-likely-to-spread-beyond-ge...