Tarantula Hunting

My dad started talking about all the tarantulas in his yard. I remember being warned of staying away from a particular area when I was a kid - a pile with wood and other stuff. I just avoided it, so I never saw any of the tarantulas. He gets scorpions, too. So he was talking about stomping on one (ouch!) and that he poured antifreeze down the holes in that area. That seems to have killed them, but he has some in an entirely different area on his property. I get that gleam and say that I want to catch some! I've never done it, it sounds exciting... so he puts off pouring gasoline down the rest of the holes so that I can come catch some.

He exaggerated the size of the holes (he tends to exaggerate), so I suppose he probably exaggerated the size of the Ts, too. All the holes he showed me looked pretty small in comparison, not even measuring an inch across. So Saturday morning I get up and get over there half an hour before sunrise. I sat and watched and fought off mosquitos for a good long while and never saw anything. He had told me that he sees them wandering around in the early morning and late evening.

I walked the perimeter of his property, looking for any other spiders or holes and found two holes that were HUGE in comparison. They were easily two inches across... and one of them had a tent web over it! OMG, I was so excited! I decided, though, that I should really start with something smaller... being my first time and all. I had been studying the chapter in my book about catching your own tarantulas.

I put a stick / twig into the holes... they didn't really seem to be as deep as they ought to have been. Some holes had crickets in them, go figure. I finally started actively hunting for them. I had been there for almost two hours before I tackled the big holes. I finally, after so much time and suspicion of Candid Camera pranks, saw a tarantula! I even managed to get it to come all the way out of the hole... for a second. I had too much trouble trying to man the stick and the bowl and the lid... he got back into his hole too quickly. After 15 minutes, I decided I had pestered this poor baby long enough. I'm pretty certain that I can get dad to grant the spiders a temporary pardon, at least. I've recruited a t-catching buddy / side-kick, but I have to schedule my time with her. I am so excited and anxious to get out there and try again! But with my work schedule... I have to sleep in the late evening and I'm at work when the sun rises. I'm going to ask him to check his clock the next time he sees them out & about... so I can try to better time my approach.

What a long, boring, then exciting morning yesterday had!! Then I came back home and went back to sleep. heh

Big Eaters

Most of my spiders pigged out the other day, so yesterday I bought 12 large and 12 small crickets. I've never bought so many at once. I went to drop one of the large ones in with Anansi and accidentally dropped two. She snagged the smaller one immediately... as soon as the larger one got close, she snagged it, too! It was the first time I've seen her struggle at all with a catch, but it was a minimal struggle (just enough to be exciting).

I have other big T news, but I don't have time to type it out right now. I just wanted to post that she ate again. Meanwhile, Babs looks like she is so fat she could burst!

Substrate & Hide advice, please - Safe Choices?

I am shopping around for substrate and hides for my B. smithi. The guy at the pet store made a recommendation for the substrate, but I'm so paranoid about buying the wrong thing. Here's what he recommended: Bed-A-Beast Litter. I was trying to find some sort of small amount to buy, so this seemed a viable option. I hate that a lot of these things don't tell you the ingredients, though! Today I shopped around the store and also found T-Rex Jungle Bed which looks a lot like what I've got (from the breeder). I know the breeder mixes two things to make his substrate, but I can't recall at the moment what those two things are.

As for the hide... I couldn't find anything small enough for the cage, so I was considering cutting a toilet paper (unscented) roll down and give that to her. Is this safe? I've seen where people use film canisters, but I think she needs something slightly larger. She has never had a hide before, but she doesn't really burrow - she just gets a little dent in the dirt or smooshes as close to a wall as possible. I think she would like a hide.

Thanks for any advice you guys can offer!

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.