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Birth of a Tarantula

Forgot one. I'd say we have around 150 of them ranging in sizes from half an inch to 8+".

Here's a couple of photos of what the current eggs are going to look like in about six weeks or so.

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And here is how they live for the next several weeks.

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Cute huh?

Any more questions? Love to answer them all.
 
Ahk! The spiders creep me out! Black widow patrol is a nightly thing for me here in the dry ditch. I have a couple small mantis' that hang out on my hab plants. No bug problems at all. Real killers those mantis!

Cheers, TB.
 
I wasn't real excited about keeping them at first believe me. My youngest son Garrett was the spider nut. Always wanted a tarantula. The spouse was a serious phobe and it wasn't going to happen. Well we ended up going our separate ways with the kids staying with me. About a week before the soon to be ex was out the door I finally caved and let my son get one. Unknowing to me it happened to be one of the more defensive species. I had trusted an 11 year old kid to pick the best one. Needless to say that spider taught us how to be careful around them. A few months after getting it the darn thing molted and died the next day. Molting is a time when things can go wrong.

As of today my son doesn't care about the spiders much anymore and it's turned into my hobby. I'm enjoying the time with them and it's rare that you can get into a hobby that not only pays for itself but also funds other things.
 
Here's one that has made it through the emerging from the egg process. These are called first instars or nymphs. If you look closely you can see the tips of the fangs have started to harden. At this point the length of a fang is less than one millimeter.

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The fuzzy part on the bottom of it's abdomen is the remains of the part that was shed off. It will eventually fall off.
 
I'll keep working on that Vincent.

They don't need to eat at this stage. Everything they need is in their abdomen. Up until recently it was thought that the didn't eat until they become spiderlings, have hair and some color.

A breeder was taking some pictures of his spiderlings, they were one more stage ahead of these, and when he was examining the photos found a couple of them with their fangs stuck into an unfertilized egg. I've since done the same thing and have had to remove several shriveled up dried empty eggs that were stuck on fangs. It's pretty easy to identify the little piggies too, they're huge compared to their brothers and sisters.
 
Pretty neat, I learned something today and I'll have to drink myself to a stuper so I don't have any nightmares..
 
Wow. The clear "infants" are so cool looking!
And I cant believe how small those little fuzzy ones are, and beautiful coloring. Will that breed keep that pretty blue?
 
Poisonette said:
Wow. The clear "infants" are so cool looking!
And I cant believe how small those little fuzzy ones are, and beautiful coloring. Will that breed keep that pretty blue?
Click to expand...

There are a few that keep a nice blue coloration into adulthood...Chromatopelma cyaneopubescens, Haplopelma lividum, and Poecilotheria metallica. Might be some I'm not thinking of, but those are the more popular ones..well the last one is popular but expensive.
 
I don't think I could just go buy one. Most spiders just creep me out completely. Especially wolf spiders. Daddy long legs, so far, are the only ones I don't mind touching.

I'd almost have to raise one from an egg so I could become attached to it over time.
 
Here is what these tiny little see through babies grow up to look like as adults. Avicularia versicolor. This is a mature male.

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Good looking guy eh?
 
It's a cousin to a pinktoe, good guess though. The scientific name for a Pinktoe is Avicularia avicularia.

The babies and the adult in the photo are all Avicularia versicolor.
 
Don't take this the wrong way - but it almost doesn't look like a real spider. It looks kinda like a kids stuffie toy shaped like a spider.
Both pics on this page are beautiful.

Are they as soft as they look?

And serious question here: What is their temperment like? They're overall personalities, are they friendly?
 
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