diff --git a/weave b/weave
index 3e6c83a6..bdaf9283 100755
--- a/weave
+++ b/weave
@@ -429,7 +429,7 @@ http_call_ip() {
     http_verb="$3"
     url="$4"
     shift 4
-    curl -s -X $http_verb "$@" http://$ip:$port$url
+    curl --connect-timeout 3 -s -X $http_verb "$@" http://$ip:$port$url
 }
 
 # Perform operation $1 on container ID $2 to local DNS database at address $3