As Jodie Pitman, Moree, discovered en route to checking floodwaters last Friday, it was in fact a mass of spiders, making webs in overdrive.

While spider numbers had increased in the wake of last November’s floods, Mrs Pitman said the blankets of webs evident on roadsides, paddocks and even the airport runway were stopping people in their tracks.

“Nobody I have spoken to has ever seen anything like it.

“Everybody keeps saying it looks like something out of a National Geographic.”

Mrs Pitman, who guessed the spiders were building contingency webs to escape the water, said they had even started building webs on her – and the family’s vehicle - when they stopped to look at it.

Fortunately, they had not made their way back to their house – although she said clumps of webs were still evident on briar bush along the roadsides.