Wolf Slings! ...Now what?

[Meer]

I've had this wolf spider for a couple of months and she laid a sac. I'm not sure what species she is. I didn't know whether the sac could be fertile because I had her for quite a while before she laid it.

But I just checked on her and she's covered with tiny slings! I'm so excited! This is the first time I've had a spider have babies. So I want to make sure I know what to do.

They will stay on the mother for a while, correct?
Will she feed them bits of her prey?
About how long till they start to disperse and need to be separated?
Anything else different I need to do for the moment, other than keep feeding the mother like normal?

Hope they don't need their own tiny prey too soon. I'm having a problem getting fruit flies.

Oh, here's a pic

 

[Meer]

Seriously guys, any tips at all would be helpful. I'm pretty clueless on the details of raising slings!

When I took that first picture the babies weren't near done emerging, now she is covered in them, it's amazing to see. I fed the mom and the babies really swarmed around. Looked like some of them were feeding off the cricket held in the mom's fangs.

But there is one group that got left behind, sitting on the egg sac that the mother left behind. Should I worry about them?

 

[aluras]

I know nothing of wolf spiders, But I like the pics and wanted to say congrats on the new little ones. :clap: how big is the mother?

 

[herpguy]

Hello,
The babies go on the mom mostly to be safe from predation. The ones on the ground should be fine. After they molt again, they all will disperse, though most should be dispersing already at that size. They will cannaballize if not separated (not recommending wasting your time separating wolfs). They will consume bits of mom's prey. After they disperse, and if you keep them together, you can throw in one large soft-bodied insect, prekilled of course, or some insect guts, they should swarm the food item and have a communal meal.
Let me know if you have any more questions!
-Dave

 

[Meer]

Thank you Dave! They are not dispersing much yet, although some of them have crawled off mom.

Ah, but what if I want to waste my time separating them? Not right away, I couldn't possibly separately house all those slings. But maybe after their numbers go down just a bit from cannibalizing? Don't know why I'd want to do that anyway. I'm not going to keep all those spiders, just a few maybe. Don't know how I'd get them all out of the enclosure anyway! Don't mind me, I'm rambling.

Thanks Aluras. I'm not sure how big the mother is, since I neglected to measure or take pictures before she got covered with babies. But I'd guess her body length at about an inch or a little less. Biggest wolf spider I've caught in my area, and not the usual rabid wolfs I see mostly. I'm curious to know what species she is, can't tell now of course with slings everywhere. Once the kids move out I'll post some pics to see if anyone here has an idea.

 

[Widowman10]

looks like it could very well be Hogna helluo. but there are others very similar also, so i won't say it's certain. helluos (among a few others) have that distinctive orange stripe.