Insect and Spider Identification: CLOSED: Mystery Spider Please help!, 0 by MichGreen11

MichGreen11 wrote:
Hi Everyone!

I'm new here and am looking for some answers from experienced gardeners. My Pekingese dog was playing with a creepy crawly in our screened in porch located in our backyard (next to our garden area) with what I assumed was a roach. I then I saw what she was playing with (it was dark outside) so I thought it was a frog because of it's size! When I went to drag the dog away from torturing the poor "frog", I realized it was a HUGE, brown, thick spider!! I called for my husband and he killed it with a garden hoe (sorry to those who don't agree with that...can't take chances with our animals and I have a huge phobia). Immediately a million (ok...so maybe I'm exaggerating a little) babies took off outside the mother. He had apparently busted a sac when he smashed the spider. I killed them with Raid for spiders. I cannot stand spiders and it's killing me not knowing what type it is and if it was dangerous as I'm sure there are plenty more just like it. I've attached 2 pictures (it's dead so it's obviously curled up and smaller, but was about 1.5 inches, including legs). Any insight as to what type of spider this may be would be extremely helpful and much appreciated! Thank you in advance! (we had assumed a wolf spider?)