SFB - No More

Señor Fuzzy Britches proved himself to be male when he built a sperm web. I tried to find someone that needed a male Curly Hair (Brachypelma albopilosum) for mating, but it is such a common species that I couldn't find any takers. They do make for good starter pets.

And so... he passed. I totally understand the majorly short life span of male tarantulas in comparison to females now. Males will stop eating once they are ready to mate. They just kind of whither away. Here is my photo dedication to Señor Fuzzy Britches:

Goodbye Tears

I am way overdue on some updates. We've moved twice and had another (human) baby since my last update. I've been meaning to get back over here, but it is hard to find time with two little humans under foot (plus I stay busy on my other blog). Spiders are so much easier! I did, however, get a little prod of inspiration this week. Stan Schultz, co-author of The Tarantula Keeper's Guide, emailed me requesting permission to link a couple of my photos from this blog. I was so excited and flattered! He was glad to inspire my return to the blog as well.

The photos he will be linking (on a care sheet on relative humidity with regard to tarantula care) were of silk turrets made by our Cobalt Blue (Haplopelma lividium), Tears. She turned out to be a he and passed away before our last move. He did stay hidden so much that we're not sure how long he was dead before we noticed. He was a gorgeous specimen.

And so, in honor of Tears, and perhaps a new tradition for this blog, here are all of my photos of him. These are unedited and not cropped - just resized for posting. (I usually crop to just the good bits.) I'm also posting these in case Stan would rather use any of my other silk turret photos. I had not posted all of them. Perhaps I can get some publishing advice from him as well! I have a partially-written basics book on tarantulas. I could use some inspiration there, too, but have another project I need to finish first.

Without further ado, here are my Tears photos:

Tigger ~ RIP

Tigger ~ RIP
Costa Rican Tiger Rump
Cyclosternum fasciatum

Sometime late yesterday, Tigger curled up against the wall of his dish and died. He was the last of the Costa Rican Tiger Rumps in our collection. As you can see, he was hardly as big around as a toothpick. He was a good eater, though, and seemed healthy enough. It is impossible to know cause of death in cases like this. I'm sad to lose Tigger.

SB - Another Death of Old Age

When I first got interested in tarantulas, I had a wish list in mind of the species I wanted to own. On the top of my list was the Avicularia versicolor. In October, we attended the Oklahoma Reptile Expo and I brought home one gorgeous A. versicolor (Antilles Pinktoe). The breeder informed us that the spider had just molted a few days prior. It had previously been turquoise (A. versicolor slings are turquoise).

Avicularia versicolor
(Antilles Pinktoe)
S.B.

Menagerie Update

We lost another Costa Rican Tiger Rump so we're down to only 1 of those. We literally seem to have lost it. We can't find it in the dish. It is as if the meal worm ate it. Elmo has laid claim to the Brazilian Whiteknee, so I've decided the Tiger Rump is mine. The rest, so far, are still "ours."

We did get the tiny meal worms and that has been an adventure. You have to dig them out of the sawdust in the little bowl and you get about 100 of them. The tiny worms are larger than some of the spiderlings! Our Elmo's Brazilian White really put up a fight with one! It was moving him around instead of vice versa. He was still winning, though! That was the 2nd time we fed him. He molted after the first feeding.

After the first round of feedings, we decided that the Brazilian Fire Reds are big enough to ¹⁾ be moved into larger dishes and ²⁾ be fed small crickets! So this weekend we picked up more substrate to put in King's cage (in an attempt to prevent further broken limbs once he molts), 3 dozen large crickets for our big kids, and 1 dozen small crickets for these particular babies.

Brazilian Fire Red

I moved these two into larger cages last night. By morning, one of them had dug a good tunnel along the edge of the bowl. We have been so lucky with burrows being dug against the sides of habitats so we can see into them! Only trouble is that Tears (Cobalt Blue) has now covered her windows with web.

My Curly Hair (not a sling) has had a great burrow dug from one side of the cage, to the end, around to the other side. He had been staying out a lot, though. Then this week we discovered that the "end" of his burrow fell in (or was dug through). Now his burrow has an entrance and an exit. I want to add more substrate, but I'm not sure if I'll be able to do so since his burrow is under so much of the surface.

The bigger babies did just fine with 3-4 small crickets each today. We also gave all the spiderlings one tiny meal worm each. This is feeding #2 for us with all the new babies. Once his Whiteknee molts again, I think we'll have to move it into a larger cup... but not much larger. I'm amazed at how FAST all of these kids are, too!

I need to put some dimes in with each of the babies so that I can (hopefully) catch photos of them for size-reference. You can see a shot of my first spiderling on a dime here.

Death by Natural Causes

Sam is the Oklahoma Brown that I caught at work (inside the building) and is responsible for setting my husband off, joining me in this hobby. He was an adult male, so we knew he wasn't long for this world. A female was seen in the vicinity, but I couldn't find her to catch her. We hope he got to breed before I caught him. Someone would likely have stomped him if he had been left in the building. In fact, multiple people from work called and texted me when he was found.

Anyway, he passed yesterday. We suspected it was coming, he has been acting... slow and shaky. We considered purchasing a spade and providing a "proper burial" but instead chose for the garbage can. My husband is anxious to purchase a new species or for me to catch another for him.

This makes the 3rd tarantula to die in my care, but it has been a few years. The 2nd was another WC Oklahoma Brown (Special K - also of natural causes). The very 1st was my 1st dear T, Mallory.

Special K

A friend of mine had her boys catch a tarantula in their driveway for me. They brought it over right away (she doesn't like spiders). I named him (a fully mature Oklahoma Brown {Aphonopelma hentzi}) after the container they used. His name was Special K. (They used to use it to hold Special K cereal.) That was a while back (early October or before), but he has now passed. I honestly think he simply died of old age.

Aphonopelma hentzi
photo from a couple of weeks ago

I haven't gotten rid of the carcass yet, in case he is just molting. I learned my lesson with Bunny!

---

Male tarantulas do not live long after reaching maturity.

Zombie Spiders? I think not.

So... on Sunday the 30th I discovered that Bunny was dead.

• Sunday, July 30^th - Discover Bunny dead... hanging from a web in her cage.
  
• Monday, July 31^st -
  • Find a huge Daring Jumping Spider
    
  • Quickly clean out Bunny's cage
    
  • Catch new spider
    
  • Pose Bunny's carcass for several photos
    
  • NOTE: I did consider that he might be molting (though I'd never heard of spiders hanging to do that... and considered putting his carcas back in the cage (with new spider) until I could decide to part with it.
• Tuesday, August 1^st - Find Bunny's EMPTY carcass... He finished molting in the night... and ran off (since he wasn't caged). <pout> I also happened upon a children's book about spiders in which they show a spider molting - in the hanging position! Whey couldn't I have found that a day or two sooner?!

I had Bunny for 9 months. He was my first pet spider. The new resident in his old cage is a much larger female named Babs. I miss Bunny, but perhaps I'll see him around. Babs is much more skittish than Bunny was, so she doesn't make nearly as good a model. Impressively, though, she catches her food then stays up in the corner of her cage to eat it.

Meanwhile, Johnny died before I could even name him. (Johnny is the spider that was caught in a porta-john.) I brought him into the kitchen today (with the rest of the spiders) so I could photograph him. Well he plays possum real well. When I picked up his cage, he moved. He's not dead! He gets into this odd position... I guess when he feels threatened. I can't tell if he ate any of the cricket I gave him. I've put a live one in there now and will check back on them periodically.

And finally - I have not yet named the white spider. I'd love a punny name or something silly... snowball, perhaps. hahaha

I've taken photographs of ALL of the spiders today, but I'm far too tired to edit them all. I was absolutely giddy in the kitchen today, though... surrounded by all my babies and a bag o' treats for them. lol

Oh, and I took Anansi with me on errands today. She doesn't like to travel and I've decided maybe she could use an actual hide. Nothing at the pet store was small enough... I'm considering using a toilet paper roll cut down to size. I think I'll post to one of my spider communities for advice on that.

Also, I fed Anansi... I dropped a couple crickets into her cage and was watching as she snagged first one, then the other... she is eating them both at the same time! She has quite the mouthful! One of them did get away after a few minutes, but it didn't get far at all!

I'm a big dork for my babies. Thanks for reading this hyooj entry!

Update

By the way... I did feed Anansi a couple of weeks ago. She ate.

Last night I removed her from her bowl, then sifted through the dirt (looking for cricket bits) and put the dirt into a slightly larger kritter keeper. I know I saw some old cricket carcasses resurface, but all I found was a single cricket leg. I sifted through the dirt with tweezers... I don't know... maybe they composted.

Anyway, she seems to like the new space just fine. I put a cricket in before I put her into the new cage. She ate. Yay! Bunny is doing fine, too. I need to clean his cage, but I need to wait until all the crickets are gone. I don't want to catch ALL of the critters to clean it. I got a new spider, too. My Husband caught it for me in the porta-john at the local skate park. It's pretty cool. I need to get photos so I can post them and ask for identification help. I looked in my reference book, but couldn't find anything like it. The new spider is in Anansi's old container. I love the new container for Anansi... I can actually SEE in there. It is maybe twice the size of the old one. I think I'll go see if there are any more crickets left and feed her another one... I also wonder if the new spider has eaten yet. I think it is used to gnats... and I gave it a small cricket.

Anyway, thanks for reading... I know I really need to post new photos. I haven't forgotten.

EDIT: I guess I was wrong. Bunny has died. I immediately caught some other kind of spider. It's white. I might catch another jumping spider, I really like them. Oh yeah, and since Bunny died, I caught the last two little crickets in with him and put them in with Anansi. She ate them each immediately as they were given to her.

American House Spider

I haven't had much time to post lately, but wanted to say... after washing all the jars, I put a little bit of water in the jar with the American House Spider to make sure it had fluids. It seemed to have a hard time starting a web (maybe from getting it's spinner end wet?) and I kept finding it in the water. I tipped the jar so that it was out of the water, but it got back into it and apparently drowned. It was interesting to see that the back legs are so short and the "abdomen" is so big that it kind of drags the ground. It would fall over from time to time.

I was actually considering setting it loose outside, but wanted to find some way to get rid of it - guilt free. I didn't kill it on purpose and feel I was doing the right thing in cleaning out the stench that was cricket carcasses. So, there you have it. And then there were two.

I think I have more photos to post... I don't guess I've looked at the photos from cleaning day at all. I just offloaded them from the camera this morning.

OK, I need to get back to other busy things. I hope everyone is well. Some of you need to POST!

Mallory's Last Photo Shoot

I had recently replaced Mallory's dirty dime with a shiny new one. Here she is, posing on it for me. This photo shoot is from February 12^th...

Brachypelma smithi spiderling - on a dime

Brachypelma smithi spiderling - on a dime

Brachypelma smithi spiderling - on a dime

These are the best three from the shoot... and I only took six! She was such a wonderful little model. If you would like to see them full size, click away.

Death

Mallory has been up against the edge of the jar for a couple of days. I was getting worried because her legs were drawn in more than usual. But... so far every freak-out I've had has been over really normal stuff (like when she burrowed and didn't come out).

She ate like her usual pigginess last Friday. I think I hurt her on Monday when she grabbed onto the paintbrush. Tonight is feeding night, I bought another dozen crickets today. Splitting them up for the three spiders proved to be an amusing test of my patience and planning. I save Mallory for last. It's been two days since I last saw her move, so I was worried. I touched her with the paintbrush. No reaction. Well that happened before, so I try some more. No reaction... other than falling away from the wall of the jar.

I haven't even had her one month. I feel sick. I've had Bunny since October. Perhaps it wasn't a good idea to get one so young after all. I don't even know what to do with the jar... and more specifically Mallory. :(

I need to email Eric now. I feel awful.

A ray of hope? I still want to have a tarantula. I've done all my homework. I was very careful choosing my species. I've read websites and read books and talked to spider people...

Anyway, that's all I wanted to say. I'll certainly post if/when I get a new tarantula. And perhaps I'll continue to post pics of Bunny and my American House Spider here.