Wolf spider (Lycosa tarantula) female carrying her egg sac beneath her abdomen. These spiders are rather large, the females being as large as 30 mm in body length and the males around 19 mm The silken sac containing over 100 eggs is carried attached to the mother's spinnerets, and then after they hatch, the spiderlings climb on their mother's abdomen and ride around with her for some time until they are sufficiently mature to survive on their own. After leaving their mother's protection, the young spiders disperse and dig burrows. Lycosa tarantula is the species originally known as the tarantula, a name that nowadays in English commonly refers to spiders in another family entirely, the Theraphosidae. It now may be better called the tarantula wolf spider, being in the wolf spider family, the Lycosidae. Lazio, Italy September 2020