Insect and Spider Identification: Super Large Web with Spiderlings in Virginia, 1 by Icarus7ac

Icarus7ac wrote:
Sorry for the poor quality of the photos, but my camera isn't the best and neither was the lighting.

Brought in the plants for the winter a few weeks back and put them in a room that's under renovation until next spring when they go back out. Must've brought in more than I bargained for. Yesterday morning, noticed a LARGE web covering the cane yuccas. Don't know how long it's been there because we don't go into that corner of the room very often. The plants are about 7 feet tall. Sparse sheet web covering the largest of the cane yuccas with a barely discernible funnel leading down to a cocoon wrapped in a yucca leaf. I say "sparse" sheet web because we have many (many!) funnel web spiders about and usually the sheets are so dense that they're opaque. This was more ... stringy. Even after spritzing with water, these are the best photos I could get. And the web stretched across half the room. The anchor "strings" went from the top of a bookcase (almost 9 feet from the funnel) to the end of a couch (a little over 6 feet from the funnel) to the back corner of a table (about 4 feet from the funnel). The sheet web covered the area in between these anchors as it flowed over the plants.

Until now, I presumed it was a funnel web (grass) spider web and egg sac. But everything I've read since says that they hatch in spring. And that egg sac I just found yesterday? Spiderlings all over. I removed the leaf and put it outside, FAR from the house. And took a broom to the web. But the spiderlings are already EVERYwhere. Makes me itch just thinking about it. They're too small to get a good image, but they're dark on the head and butt with a lighter stripe in between. Kind of like a brown Oreo from Hell.

I never saw Mom. And would be happy if I never did.

So, what are these things? What hatches in November? I'm OK with the babies being around (I'm no fan, but I know they're beneficial creatures). As long as they're harmless grass spiders and not something more ominous.