Wolf Spiders (Lycosidae)

Chances are, if you're looking under logs, you'll see these guys scurrying away:

A yet-to-be-IDed wolf spider.

These, as the captions indicate, are wolf spiders. I went and posted the photo on both BugGuide and iNaturalist, and am waiting for an expert to weigh in with their opinion. I think it's Tigrosa annexa, a female, but I'm not so sure. I'll either edit this post, or put it in the comments what it actually is. 

These spiders like to hide under debris by day, but do wander outside during the during those hours as well.  These are, like many spiders of its shape and build, wandering spiders. This means that, though they have a shelter to sleep/rest in, they prowl in search of prey. They do not spin a web to catch flies, nor any web-trap. They just sneak up, and pounce. These spiders eat roaches, crickets, small beetles, things of that nature. The prey items (of individual) are usually size  respective, meaning that a giant one of these would likely eat a bigger roach or graduate from crickets to grasshoppers. 

Now, I didn't catch this one (I took the photo, though), so I can't say where it was found. My guess is that it was crawling around in grass, under debris, or scurrying across an open area. My yard (and the surrounding area) has lots of roaches, crickets, and grasshoppers. I believe this one is female, seeing as it has a larger abdomen than an average male, and it might be carrying eggs. I released the creature afterwards (today).

    

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