Lace Weaver Spider Identification Guide

Key Visual Features

Lace weaver spiders are named for the fine, lacy, bluish-white webs they spin using a specialized silk-combing structure called a cribellum.

• Size: Body length generally 8-15 mm, with a fairly robust build.
• Color: Mottled gray, brown, and tan patterning across the abdomen, providing effective camouflage against bark and stone.
• Body shape: Moderately stout, with a somewhat flattened abdomen bearing a leaf-like or chevron pattern in many species.
• Legs: Eight legs, banded in alternating light and dark tones, often held close to the body when at rest in a retreat.
• Silk: The web has a distinctive fluffy, bluish, woolly-looking texture created by combing silk with the hind legs — this cribellate silk is one of the best identification clues, since it looks and feels different from the smooth, sticky silk of typical orb weavers.
• Web structure: An irregular sheet or funnel of lacy silk built against bark, rock crevices, or wall surfaces, usually with a tubular retreat to one side.

Where and When You'd See It

Lace weaver spiders favor sheltered vertical surfaces — tree bark, stone walls, fence posts, and the sides of buildings. Their webs are most conspicuous at night or in early morning light when dew highlights the fine woolly strands. The spiders themselves are largely nocturnal, remaining hidden in a silk retreat during the day and emerging after dark to repair the web and wait for prey.

Similar-Looking Bugs

• Mesh web weavers: Also cribellate web builders with a similarly woolly silk texture, but generally build webs low in vegetation rather than against bark or stone.
• Funnel-web type spiders: Build a funnel retreat too, but their silk is smooth rather than the fluffy, combed texture of lace weaver silk.
• Orb weavers: Build organized circular webs with smooth, sticky spiral silk, quite different from the irregular lacy sheet of a lace weaver.

Quick ID Checklist

• Mottled gray-brown body camouflaged against bark or stone
• Fluffy, bluish-white lacy silk texture, unlike smooth orb-weaver silk
• Irregular sheet web with a tubular retreat built into a crevice
• Found on tree trunks, stone walls, or building exteriors
• Mostly nocturnal, most active and visible after dark

Behavior Notes

The comb-like cribellate silk snags the fine hairs and claws of walking insects, so this spider relies on texture rather than stickiness to trap prey, then rushes from its retreat to subdue anything caught in the mesh.