Male Hogna sp. Central Texas. Came in my house the same day as a female wolf spider (Rabidosa rabida) It was a scary night, I stumbled upon two huge spiders by my front door, which hopefully only snick in when the door was opened and aren't getting in another way!
Amazing! Was leaning towards male because of the pedipalps too, thank you for confirming! After housing him and the other wolf spider that was found before him, the female spun an egg sac the very next day! Could he be the father? And would he have anything to do with Miss Selene's missing legs?
P.S. I will take better pictures soon, I was so scared when taking the pics but am getting more used to them now. Also, is there a way to tell how healthy the egg sac looks from these pictures alone? And would housing them together be a wise idea?
Different genera, so he's not the father. The one with the sac looks to be Rabidosa sp. The male could be the reason she's missing legs, but there are plenty of other things out there that are likely to try to eat her too.
The sac doesn't look particularly healthy, but it could just be a small brood that she used extra silk on. The eggs will swell up too once the get closer to hatching, which should help fill out the sac. Lycosids shouldn't be housed together at any stage unless you want to eventually end up with one. Even for breeding purposes it's recommended to put the male in, let them mate, and promptly remove the male before the female gets to him (she might anyway).
Excellent information, eggsackly what I needed to know! Thank you @pannaking22! Lol, I will keep them separated in large glass jars (5lb [24.9476 Kg] stuffed queen Olive glass jar) with eco earth substrate, water dish and hide, and keep them fed with LPS crickets that I buy for my Texas Bark Scorpion and two (male and female) widow species spiders.
And I will keep Arachnoboards posted on any updates/news!
@Daniel0430 figures I didn't see your comment in time... this Thanksgiving i got bit by the love bug, I freed the widows early afternoon when the day turned out to be warm and sunny, I got swept away imagining them carefree and happy in the wild, instead of in my temporary small plastic container housing that they were in. :'( There are were many widows around my home, but only females, that I killed because they were either in my house, in my window sill, on my back porch. The male that I released I originally captured because it was the first and only male widow I have even come across, spotted him on the back of a chair my husband was sitting on. I thought wow, I have heard widows reproduce quickly so it would be interesting and amazing to observe them, and there were so many females around at the time, so I scooped him up and a female. I'm so sorry I couldn't hold onto them long enough to share the interesting perspective and observation opportunity! Another thing I was worried about was if the female and male were different species, then having them together wouldn't be very wise either. Upon closer observation of the female I noticed she wasn't black and thought she could have been a brown widow or a juvenile. The male was reddish I think (I am colorblind, so could have been orange, tan... etc,) but was definitely a male, much smaller than the female and roundness at the end of the pedipalps. I will notify you if the opportunity presents itself again!
Thanks been wanting to see some pictures of some l.hesperus or some red widows if you come across any. And if one of them were brown widows or you come across any I would recommend killing them not that I like killing a spider but they are pushing the western black widow Into other territories or killing them off.
Good to know! I will definitely do what I can to help, I will upload pics for identification as I see them. I am sure I have seen many western, red, and brown widows, I read somewhere the brown ones are more dangerous as far as bites go. I try to keep my home immaculate for the most part to prevent anything unwanted, but I notice about once a month I will find small masses of tangled web under a chair or inconspicuous dark corners/cracks, most likely from juveniles. I'll send you a shout out when I have any updates!
Brown widows aren't as lethal venom wise as the black widow family which is a good thing but still dangerous and thanks can't wait for updates. I have four widows two males two females and an egg sack. All are southern black widows (Latrodectus mactans)
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