this spider was inside the screened porch of my home in charleston, sc . can someone help identify it? it was probably about 2" in size, dark brown and black with a lighter brown marking on its underside, on the abdomen. we've never seen anything similar before.
thanks
it looks like one of the "house spiders" but i don't know which one. the southern house spider is similar but larger, at least around here.
This appears to be a female wolf spider (family Lycosidae). See http://www.pbase.com/tmurray74/wolf_spiders_lycosidae for some more examples. Specimens this large can give a painful bite if mishandled.
