Tarantulas and Spiders

[4theSNAKElady]

Damon, did u seriously put a spongebob house in your Ts enclosure?????!!

sent from my incubator

[3skulls]

Ok so I tired to add up all the Ts.
Adding in what's going out and what's coming in, I'm pushing 300.

Currently working with 20 species.
But it feels like I'm forgetting someone.

He lives in a pineapple under the sea!!

[BFE Pets]

Damon, did u seriously put a spongebob house in your Ts enclosure?????!!

sent from my incubator

Don't judge me!

[BFE Pets]

Just checked on the Hapalopus sp. Colombia/large 14 of 18 have no crickets running around! makes me feel a lot better. So how often is to often to feed T's? I so want to feed all the babies so they can grow up big and strong! Rich I need a bag of miracle grow for T's. got any? lol

[Mike41793]

I'm still hoping your vagans is a boy! My friend has 6 adult female vagans and really needs a boy. i've been looking at microsopes on ebay. seriously investing in a nice one so I can sex my T's as small as 3/4"-1".

Should be able to tell by next molt! I really hope its male for him. If there's a way i could possibly sex it now as an immature one lmk and i'll try to.

What would you look at under the microscope to sex them? I think i have an old one in the basement from when i was a kid. Like from a "beginner science kit" or something. How good of one do you need?

As far as feeding when they're young i feed a couple times a week up to every ten days and its fine for them i think. Right after they molt feeding them a couple times a week is good too bc thats when they need the most food to grow the most and recover their size. Some people do once a week, some every other week, and some only once a month. I feel like in the wild the T's would eat more than once a month, but maybe not. They seem to be pretty flexible and grow well regardless. The more you feed the faster they'll grow, but feeding them less often doesn't really seem to negatively effect them in any way. Idk for sure though

[3skulls]

You got it Mike.
I feed once a week for the babies and 1-2 weeks for the bigger ones. But I'm also feeding dubia to them.
I'm going to try and start feeding the babies twice a week to get some size on them so its a little easier.
At smaller sizes, all the energy goes into growth. The more they feed, the faster they grow, shorter the life span.

Ts in the wild wont have nice fat abdomens like someone's pet. They are ambush predators and can long periods without food. If my larger ones look plump, I'll skip a week.

I'm in no rush for any of mine to grow, even the ones I pass along. (Besides the smallest babies, but it will be better for me and them once they get some size)

Also keep in mind. When they are big and plump, they are at higher risk of getting hurt if they fall.
You also want to keep that in mind when you ship them. Never give them a huge meal then pack them up.

[BFE Pets]

I dont know for sure how good of a microscope you would need to look at a molt. I'm looking at the ones with a light and usb hook up so I can save pics on my laptop. the microscope just makes it easier to see when they are small. The better the scope the smaller molt you can look at.

Here's a pic of what you are looking for when sexing.

[3skulls]

I have a USB scope. It's ok but nothing real fancy.
A jewelers loop or something would work better IMO.

When they are small, its not just how much you can magnify but its also what kind of shape the molt is in.

Try to get to it as soon as it happens, before it dries out. Pin it open and take a look. When its dry, put it in a little humidity box then pin it open.

If they ball up their molt forget about it and wait for the next one :p

[BFE Pets]

I have a 10x jewlers loop that I use on young geckos. i'll give that a try before I spend a small fortune on a microscope. I like the idea of being able to email a magnified pic of the molt to confirm the sex when selling spiders. I still want an ultrasound machine for my snakes too.

[Mike41793]

Interesting.... I'll have to give this a go.

EDIT: i was feeding my babies a couple times a week, say 8-10times a month. I felt like that was just too much and I added more T's so i scaled it back to once every 7-10days. For my small ones (under one inch) sometimes i'll feed just them twice a week. I also noticed if any of them refuse on the once every 7-10 days schedule that i'll wait a couple weeks for a molt before offering again. Maybe they just weren't hungry but usually (for me so far) it's been because they're gunna molt.