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Caring for Your New Tarantula |
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In
History.
In the middle ages, Italians danced the “tarantella”
-- so called because observers thought the exuberant dancers jumped
around as if suffering from Tarantula bites.
In Movies.
A few decades ago, the movie “Tarantula” featured gigantic
Tarantulas that ate mobile homes. (Thanks
to Jim Small for correcting this incredibly important historical Hollywood
footnote. Pick up your Aqualand T-shirt prize next time you come
into Aqualand, Jim.) Years
later, a cinnamon Tarantula walked across James Bond’s chest in one of
his screen adventures. And
Indiana Jones found himself covered with Mexican red-legged Tarantulas in
his very first action-packed movie.
In Real Life.
Let’s face it, Tarantulas fascinate people.
We enjoy the way they walk like little wind-up toys.
Tarantulas usually walk tentatively, as if walking on thin ice.
We’re always surprised when they literally leap to capture their
food. Hungry Tarantulas can
move very fast when pursuing prey. Not for Everyone.
Tarantulas make fascinating and easy to keep pets.
Although, not
everyone loves the hairy little beasts.
If you avoided seeing the movie “Arachnophobia,”
then the Tarantula is not a pet for you.
But for most of us, something about Tarantulas gives them a
“mystique” of their own.
Cage Requirements.
Female Tarantulas spend most of their lives within two feet of
their burrow. Any Tarantulas
seen out roaming are males looking for a good time.
A 10-gallon aquarium gives a Tarantula all the space it needs.
The slightly smaller plastic critter carriers with locking lids and
the glass critter cages with sliding lids also make perfect choices.
They even allow enough room for decorations.
A proper cage serves a higher purpose than merely imprisoning your
spider. The cage also protects
your spider from harm.
Loners.
Keep your Tarantulas in separate cages.
Most will fight to the death if housed together.
The winner eats the loser. Dividers
rarely keep them apart. They
are dedicated arguers. The
only Tarantulas that live together are the slightly smaller Pink Toes –
a type of tree-dwelling Tarantula. We
don’t see Pink Toes as often these days. Low Maintenance.
No cold morning or evening walks required.
No neighbors complaining about your Tarantulas howling at the moon
or decorating his backyard. No
shoveling smelly piles out of your own backyard.
A semi-monthly cleaning will usually suffice. Vacation Time?
If you feed your Tarantulas well before going on your summer
vacation, no one needs to come over daily and feed them for you.
Your Tarantulas can skip meals for a couple weeks, if well fed
ahead of time. They will need
water during this fasting period. Menu.
Tarantulas eat most any insects.
They fare well enough on crickets, but it’s always a good idea to
vary their diet. Give them
some mealworms, superworms, or an occasional roach to expand their
menu. No animal thrives on a
single food. Change their food
occasionally. Forget most caterpillars.
Oddly enough, many Tarantulas learn to eat goldfish. Provide Water.
Keep a small water dish in their cages.
Tarantulas expire very quickly when kept without water.
(Forget that nonsense about them
living in the desert.) Putting a little blob of aquarium filter floss in the container
lets them rest on top and drink their water at leisure.
The new desert-oriented water dishes look very good in Tarantula
houses. Cricket Saver.
Crickets drown in the tiniest amounts of water.
Put a rock, piece of wood, or filter floss in your Tarantula’s
water bowl, so that any crickets that wander in can climb from the water
easily.
Keep Covered.
Tarantulas like to climb. Whatever
you keep them in needs a lid. They
can also lift the lids off unsecured cages.
They can easily climb up the sides of a glass aquarium.
They use their invisible web strands to affix handholds to
otherwise slick surfaces.
Deadly Fangs?
Will Tarantulas kill you? Of
course not. Most
could puncture you. Not likely, but
they could. If your Tarantula
rares up on its hind legs, quit pestering it.
It’s ready to fight.
Rose-hair
Tarantulas rarely get ticked off. They
adjust to people very quickly. Some
have described their sting as somewhere between a mosquito bite and a bee
sting. Take their word for it.
Irritating Hairs.
The Tarantula’s main line of offense involves grabbing hairs from
the back of its abdomen and throwing them at enemies.
A clutch of fiberglass-type hairs in the eyes of the wiliest coyote
will change its mind about snacking on a Tarantula. Tarantula
hairs have been sold as itching powder for years.
Wash your hands after handling them. Handle with Care.
You’re in little danger from handling most Tarantulas. Your Tarantula
is the one that’s in danger. If
you drop your Tarantula on the floor, he’ll crack like an egg.
He might live another week, but he’s as good as dead. Cage Floor.
Some critters live better over certain types of surfaces.
Tarantulas don’t really care.
Use whatever you like. We’re
partial to the more colorful substrates that show off the spiders better.
Some fans use damp vermiculite. Vermiculite makes them nearly
invisible. Provide a Cave.
Most Tarantulas like a hiding place such as a cave or rock to hide
behind or under. Even a piece of
decorative wood or an overhanging leaf will serve their purpose.
They strive to re-create the security of their burrow. Or give
them enough damp vermiculite to dig their own burrow.
Long Lived.
Tarantulas live several years -- over a decade.
They shed their old skin as they grow.
They shed quite frequently during their first year.
Unfortunately, there’s no reliable way to determine their current
age.
Molting.
Tarantulas “molt” or shed their skins as they grow.
If you look in the cage and think you see two spiders, relax.
Your spider just molted. Most
replace lost limbs and regrow new “hair” when they molt.
They get inactive right before and immediately after they molt.
Don’t chuck yours out if it suddenly stops moving -- even if you
find it lying on its back. Newly
molted Tarantulas are soft and vulnerable for a few days.
Leave them alone. Sexing.
During
their last year of life, males develop “hooks” on their front legs.
That’s the only way you can tell the sexes apart – and only
during their last year of life. The
females are usually much plumper.
Males are leaner but not meaner. If you plan to breed them, remember that
hungry female spiders may eat
their mates. Tarantula females
are not as bad as black widows, but be prepared to rescue your male.
Breeding.
You get lots of spiderlings from your female Tarantula.
Unfortunately, their favorite food is other spiderlings.
Put each one in its own tiny container (plastic tube with moist
substrate). Unless you have a good supply of fruit flies or pinhead crickets,
you won’t raise many baby Tarantulas.
Most breed in October and lay their eggs next June. Note: The two gals above laid their eggs in October. We will wrap their critter cages in panty hose to keep the tiny spiderlings from infesting our entire store. Then we intend to put a 100 or so in pill bottles with some moist vermiculite and grow them for a while. Good Selections
... Rose-Hairs
Tarantulas.
Easy to get along with. Tarantula
owners like these because they will crawl on their owners and shock their
friends. Be
the first kid on your block to get one. Their hairs have a
pinkish tinge. As they mature, they get rosier and prettier. Cinnamon/Tan
Tarantulas.
About the same as a rose hair in shades of brown.
Mild-mannered also. Redlegs/Red
Knees.
Mexican Red-Legged Tarantulas are easily the prettiest Tarantulas.
Unfortunately, we can’t import them into our county anymore.
Maybe they were running out in Note.
Remember Indy escaping from the treasure cave totally covered with Mexican
Red-Legged Tarantulas? Probably
the best scene in the whole movie. Thousands
of dollars worth of very pretty, potential pet spiders. Other Embargos.
Haiti
occasionally
embargoes
their spiders. As a result,
many spiders cost almost double what they cost a few years ago.
Tarantula availability varies from day to day for a variety of
reasons. Striped-Knee
Tarantulas.
Almost as good looking as the red legs (but not quite).
Pink Toe Tarantulas. Rather dainty looking, these neat little guys and gals live together in groups – the only variety that gets along with its own kind. They are tree dwellers who also love to climb all over their cages. Ungood
Choices ...
Cobalt Blues.
These particular tarantulas are usually unfriendly.
They’re looking for an argument most of the time.
Not a kid’s pet.
Baboons.
Several different types of Baboon Tarantulas can be found from time
to time. Most are
argumentative. They move very
fast when they want to, and they bite.
Not a kid’s pet. Banana Tarantulas.
“Six-foot, seven-foot, eight-foot bunch, Hide the deadly black
Tarantula.” These used to
come in on bananas all the time. They’re
not really deadly, but they’re not really friendly either.
(They’re probably the Black Woolies.) We will ask Harry
Belafonte when we have lunch next time.
Bird-Eaters.
Bird-Eating Spiders also show up occasionally.
These guys get large enough to catch birds.
These are some of the larger Tarantulas.
Reputedly with an “arm span” large enough to span a dinner
plate. Well, at least they eat birds (baby birds).
Goliath
Tarantulas.
This is the largest of the bird-eating spiders.
Give all the Bird-Eating Spiders extra room.
King Baboon. Very pretty. Very aggressive. Very expensive. Not your best starter tarantula.
Great Pets.
Most Tarantulas adjust to captivity quite easily.
They settle down and seldom threaten their owners. The Blue Cobalts,
Starbursts, and Baboons are the most easily upset of the ones we’ve seen.
They’re always mad. However,
many Tarantulas make very easy pets to keep. LA. © 1980, © 2002, © 2003, © 2004, © 2005, © 2006 LA Productions James Bingham,
January 11, 2006 A: Thanks for YOUR time James. Actually
I prefer this type of letter to the “love your web site”
comments. You’ve provided some good info. Most of my
comments were for tarantulas in general as opposed to species specific
comments.
Jennifer Garson, June 3, 2006
I did a bit of research online after viewing your page with the photos of the dead tarantula with a maggot. I thought the following information might be helpful to you: Parasites Not all species that associate with tarantulas are beneficial. Tarantulas fall victim to a diverse range of parasitic organisms. Of these the most well known are the tarantula hawk-wasps. Females of these large wasps seek out large spiders including theraphosids on which to lay their eggs. Once a wasp has located a tarantula, it lures it from its burrow and delivers a paralyzing sting through one of the spider’s flexible membranes (e.g. a leg joint). The paralyzed spider is then entombed within its own burrow or one dug in advance by the wasp. The wasp deposits a single egg on the immobilized spider and seals the burrow with soil. On hatching the wasp maggot proceeds to devour the still living spider which eventually dies. The fully developed maggot then pupates and emerges from the burrow as a large, metallic tarantula hawk-wasp. There are also parasitic flies that have maggots which burrow into the spider and feed internally. Prior to pupation they burst out of the spider’s abdomen killing it in the process. Some mite species are also tarantula parasites. These tend to be white in color and attach themselves to membranous regions on the spider’s external surface. Unlike the other parasites, these do not usually lead to the death of a tarantula unless the tarantula is weakened by secondary factors. In captivity mites have been seen to die out over time which suggests they may need secondary hosts or specific conditions to complete their life cycles. A: Thanks for the research, Jennifer, but this tarantula was not immobilized. In fact, it was in captivity half a year before the larva of "whatever" emerged. If the tarantula had become torpid, we'd have suspected a wasp larva. It was entirely asymptomatic. But I think you're right, the "thing" was about the right size. How and when the tarantula could have been parasitized, is still a mystery. LA
Tarantulas © 2006
LA Productions
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Cobalt tarantulas get even nastier when you pester them. Great fangs.
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