They're heeeeeere! (New tarantulas!)

I’ve posted this picture before. This was my male before maturity. Even just opening the top of a 2 gallon tank , he would flip himself on his back with legs and fangs ready to grab what ever came close.

You are aware that OBT stands for Orange bitty thing right? At the time I was into T’s more hobbyists were nailed by this species than any other. I have never seen a docile one. Definitely hone your skills before getting one of these little demons. LOL

P. Irminia and P. Cambridge are the two I’ve had experience with teleporting themselves. Lightning fast. Not that all tarantulas are not quick but that group of tree spiders are like no others I’ve experienced.
While trying to rehouse an adult female P. Irminia, she slipped past the catch bottle, up the bottle, up my arm , across my chest and down my opposite arm before I could react. That got the adrenaline pumping immediately!

Pterinochilus murinus Pterinochilus murinus - Google Search

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Haha yes, I’m well aware of the name and reputation of the Orange Bitey Thing. And I don’t doubt that on the whole, they’re among the most defensive and reactive species. I’ll definitely want to hone my skills with some more bolty and/or defensive New World species before taking the leap to anything Old World.

I’m thinking my next T species will probably be A. avicularia and/or C. versicolor. I definitely want to add something arboreal to my collection, and those both seem like a good place to start for arboreals. Plus they’re both absolutely gorgeous as slings and adults.

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Avics are absolutely beautiful!
Avicularia avicularia or Pink Toe was the tarantula that got me started. My ex wanted one. I became fascinated one morning watching it clean each foot one by one. So graceful how it hung on the side of it’s enclosure preening itself. I was hooked.

The Versicolor was still classified in the Avicularia group back when I was still in the hobby. There has been so many reclassifications since then.
T. Gigas or as it is now P. Gigas is another you should take a look at for tree spiders. It’s a gorgeous orange tree spider.

P. pulcher (Panama Blonde) is another arboreal T that’s pretty calm also and beautiful.

All this talk of tarantulas has got me wanting them more and more …LOL

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Look at the T. rasti for an arboreal as well. Super calm and a really heavy webber. And its a pretty purple T.

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Pixie (T. albopilosus) molted! She took her first post-molt meal last night. Unfortunately, I’d have to take apart her whole enclosure and destroy her burrow to retrieve the molt, so I’m just gonna leave it in there. Pixie is too small to have the molt sexed anyway. She does look bigger now, though! I’d post pictures, but she’s basically a pet hole, so I haven’t managed to take any.

Delilah, my black widow, molted last week, so Mathilde (G. pulchripes) is my only spider who hasn’t yet molted in my care…and she’s still slamming food quite enthusiastically, so I don’t think she’s likely to molt any time soon.

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Pixie may very well bring that molt upnto the surface and leave it for you. Ive had a few do that.

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Lol :joy:, this is wonderful :rofl:

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For a while, her burrow was right up against the acrylic wall of the enclosure, so I could see her in her burrow and even got to watch her dig a lot of it…but she has now expanded her burrow and dug tunnels into the centre of the enclosure away from the walls, so now I hardly lay eyes on her. I only knew she was getting ready to molt because she sealed up the burrow entrance and refused food, and I only knew she was done molting because she opened up her burrow entrance and then took a cricket I put in there when I saw she’d opened up the entrance again. After taking a closer look, I did finally see a few legs of the molt that were barely visible towards the bottom of the burrow/enclosure.

So yeah, pet hole. :joy:

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My young A. seemani is pretty much a pet hole. And I’ve only aeen my A. chalcodes like twice I think this year. She sealed herself in for like 4 months, came out for a few crickets and a super worm and then sealed herself in again.

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Yeah, a lot of spiders (and inverts more generally) tend to hide a lot…which makes sense, given that virtually everything wants to eat them in the wild. One of the reasons I chose the G. pulchripes as one of my first Ts is that they’re known to be out on display more often than a lot of other species. And so far, my pulchripes is usually out at least a couple times a week, even at her small size. She spends most of her time in her hide, but she comes out way more than the little T. albopilosus.

Delilah, my black widow, is the spider I see the most. She has places she can hide, but she usually hangs out in the open. She really only retreats to a hiding place if something really startles her. Normally I can even pick up and move her enclosure and open and close the door without her running for cover. I love that I get to see so much of her.

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Well, now Mathilde has sealed herself up in her hide, so it would seem that she’s getting ready to join the molting club! Since she hasn’t burrowed deeply and is mostly just under a hide, her molt should be much easier to retrieve. She’s also a lot bigger than Pixie, so I might have a shot at sexing the molt, assuming the abdomen is relatively intact by the time I get to it. We shall see!

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Well, false alarm on Mathilde molting. Turns out she was just doing some home improvement. She sealed up one end of her hide but then opened up the other end, so I guess she just wanted to have the door on the other side. Oh well!

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On second (third?) thought, I think she is in pre-molt after all. She’s now mostly sealed up both entrances to her hide. When I saw her going in and out of the entrance she’d opened up, I think she was actually in the process of closing it off. She’s also refusing food, and she’s never done that before with me, so I think I was right the first time and she is indeed preparing to molt.

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It took some time, but she did indeed bring it to the surface eventually! I found and retrieved it today. However, as expected, it’s teeny tiny and I’m not even going to try to sex it. I honestly can’t even tell if the abdomen is intact. But I can see her itty bitty little fangs on it, which is pretty cool!

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Couple updates on Pixie and Mathilde.

Mathilde seems to have finished molting and has re-emerged. I haven’t lifted her hide to retrieve the molt yet, but I’ll do that when I feed her tomorrow. She may have technically emerged a few days ago, I was expecting her to open up one entrance of her hide, and she ended up opening up the opposite side (because of course she did), so she emerged from the side I wasn’t watching, but I finally saw her today.

And Pixie molted again! She ate, like, twice after her last molt, then sealed up her burrow and molted again. Wasn’t expecting that! I thought she’d just sealed up her burrow for some other reason and was a little perplexed, but I just saw a fresh molt down in the bottom of her burrow a few minutes ago. She hasn’t re-emerged yet, so I assume she’s still hardening up her exoskeleton. I’ll offer her a post-molt meal once she opens up the entrance to her burrow. I can’t believe how fast she’s growing!! Absolutely wasn’t expecting another molt so quickly, but the sooner she gets big and fluffy, the better!

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Remember to give your tarantula a few days to harden up after the molt. The bigger the spider, the longer the wait.

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I know, but thanks for the reminder! Pixie is pretty freshly molted, I got a look at her fangs just now when I was giving her some water, and they’re that sort of reddish-brown colour they turn before they’re fully hardened.

I’m a little less certain about when Mathilde actually finished molting. I’ll be on the lookout for her to be in a position where I can get a look at her fangs, but if that’s not possible, I’ll definitely give her a few days before offering food and remove the feeder if she doesn’t go for it right away (she’s typically been a very eager eater).

For now I’m just making sure they have the opportunity to re-hydrate.

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Just wanted to give a bit of an update on my T babies.

Both Pixie (T. albopilosus) and Mathilde (G. pulchripes) are doing wonderfully! Both are looking pretty plump at the moment, since I gave them a pretty substantial Christmas dinner last night. :joy:

Mathilde is looking gorgeous after her molt. She already had the start of light banding at her leg joints when I got her, but now that banding is more yellow, and she also now has some faint chevron markings on her knees (appeared after her molt), so she’s well on her way to having those beautiful adult markings that are so distinctive of the species. I’m also seeing her out of her hide a lot more since she emerged after her last molt. She’s exhibiting more of the behaviour I’ve read about with adult G. pulchripes: strolling around the enclosure, moving substrate around, filling her water bowl with dirt, etc. I love observing her, and I love that I get to see her out and about so often. I even handled her a couple times with my roommate (who didn’t want to hold her, but was fascinated watching me hold and interact with her), and Mathilde was lovely and calm both times. She continues to be a voracious eater who will devour any feeder I toss to her. Unfortunately she destroyed her molt before I got to it, so the jury is still out on “her” sex. I think she probably is large enough to sex now, it’s just a question of retrieving an intact molt.

Pixie is also doing great! After molting twice in quick succession, she’s now established a nice burrow entrance that she’s reinforced with webbing, and I often see her hanging out at the burrow entrance. She’s looking more and more like an actual tarantula! When I got her, she just had a tiny little patch of black fuzz on her abdomen, but now her entire abdomen is covered in “fur.” And she has some visible setae on her legs now as well. She’s also SO much bigger than when I got her. I think after another molt or two, it will be time to upgrade her enclosure to something larger (she’s currently in the little “sling crib” from Tarantula Cribs). She’s also been eating well, although she’s so shy that she won’t eat in front of me the way Mathilde will. I usually just drop a couple crickets in there and then notice they’re gone an hour or so later.

So yeah, both of my tarantula babies are doing great, and I’m absolutely loving them! So happy I finally pulled the trigger and got these two cuties, I totally adore them. And I’m very happy with the species I chose, I think they both make great “beginner” tarantulas. They’re super easy to care for and are so much fun to observe and interact with.

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Awesome! Great update!

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I’ll try to get some updated pictures to post soon. I’ve actually caught Pixie fully out of her burrow a few times…but she’s always managed to dart back into hiding as soon as I have my phone ready. It’s like she knows. Still, I’m hopeful I might finally manage to get a full-body photo of her one of these days.

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