Anyone keep tarantulas?

[Boffin]

Is there anyone else on these boards who shares this addictive hobby? Or what are your thought about keeping tarantulas?
Please feel free to ask any questions about them if you have any. There's a lot of misinformation going around about these animals so I'm always glad to help educate.

First of all I'd like to state tarantulas are NOT deadly nor are they dangerous. Most species have relatively mild venom although some species can be considered to have a "medically significant" bite. They are not agressive (some are quite defensive though) and bites are very rare. I myself have never been bitten and know lots of people who have been in the hobby for 1-30 years without ever getting bitten.
Also I'm against handling tarantulas and will only ever do so if necessary (to save their life for example). This is a hand off hobby. Treating these animals with care and respect is top priority.

here's a list of species I currently own:
Acanthoscurria geniculata 0.0.1
Avicularia metallica 0.1.0
Avicularia versicolor 0.1.0
Brachypelma albopilosum 0.1.0
Brachypelma auratum 0.1.0
Brachypelma boehmei 0.1.0
Brachypelma emilia 0.1.0
Brachypelma smithi 1.1.0
Grammostola rosea 0.1.0
Haplopelma vonwirthi 1.1.0
Heteroscodra maculata 0.1.4
Lasiodora parahybana 1.2.0
Lampropelma violaceopes 1.1.0
Monocentropus balfouri 0.0.2
Nhandu chromatus 0.1.0
Nhandu coloratovillosus 0.1.0
Orphneacus sp. blue
Poecilotheria fasciata 0.0.3
Poecilotheria metallica 0.0.1
Poecilotheria miranda 0.0.4
Poecilotheria pederseni 0.0.3
Poecilothere rufilata 1.2.0
Poecilotheria striata 1.2.0
Poecilotheria subfusca highland 0.0.6
Poecilotheria tigrinawesseli 0.0.1
Psalmopoeus cambridgei 0.0.3
Psalmopoeus irminia 0.1.0
Psalmopoeus reduncus 0.0.3

the numbers behind the species names mean is the amount of males.females.unsexed specimens I have.

Poecilotheria rufilata

Avicularia versicolor

Psalmopoeus irminia

 

[Weird]

awesome stuff

I did a tv segment on rose hairs once when I was in the pet industry.

 

[Mr.Fastcast]

These are the only spider that make you won't to reach out and pet them,it's the fur.

We have a few spiders here in the desert,I've seen tarantulas up north but never in the desert regions.

My son and I where on a fishing trip when I seen the last one.He was so freaked out by the site of this spider,that he wanted me to kill it.I told him that it is not harming you,or I.Why kill it?Told him how cool of a spider it was,he didn't by it.I think it was just the shear size of it that freaked him out.

Thanks for the great pics

 

[Boffin]

yes the fur is what makes them so cute! I don't understand why lots of people say that's what freaks them out so much.

 

[Piel]

I had one once and it was fun but the crickets cherping got to me -had snakes and mice and spiders etc in my dorm room.

 

[pisspotgrower]

That is so cool mate, i had no idea some spiders could look so beautiful

my wife on the other hand just said " no fuckin way " n i hadnet even aske yet lol

 

[Boffin]

There's so many beautiful spiders in the world my favourites are tarantulas and jumping spiders.

Next week there will be arriving a few new specimens I recently acquired

I got myself two subadult males for my B. smithi and P. rufilata. Really looking forward to breeding these (especially the P. rufilata)
If succesful the B. smithi can be expected to have about 300-1000+ siblings. The P. rufilata has a more modest eggcount of about 50-150.

And finally I acquired myself 2 juveniles of imo one the most beautiful species in the hobby. Monocentropus balfouri.

the picture is not mine. I will make some of my specimens when they arrive

 

[Persephone]

Wow...nice spiders Boffin!

I've not kept any exotics, don't even know whats available here in Australia, but I kept Selenocosmia crassipes for a couple of years.
Fascinating critters, one of the most interesting things I found, when I had one set up in a tank, was peoples reaction to them!

Here's a pic of one I caught wandering through the kitchen just recently!
A plane Jane compared to Monocentropus balfouri!

P.

 

[pisspotgrower]

There's so many beautiful spiders in the world my favourites are tarantulas and jumping spiders.

Next week there will be arriving a few new specimens I recently acquired

I got myself two subadult males for my B. smithi and P. rufilata. Really looking forward to breeding these (especially the P. rufilata)
If succesful the B. smithi can be expected to have about 300-1000+ siblings. The P. rufilata has a more modest eggcount of about 50-150.

And finally I acquired myself 2 juveniles of imo one the most beautiful species in the hobby. Monocentropus balfouri.
View Image
the picture is not mine. I will make some of my specimens when they arrive

That is just outa this world mate....really really impressed...any chance of getting a look at an actuall tank ya keep em in...instered in seeing there homes

 

[Boffin]

that's a pretty spider Persephone!
and yes peoples reactions are quite interesting from "cool!" to "I'm never setting foot in this town again"


Here's a few pictures of some of my setups pisspotgrower. Most are kept fairly simple, as I have quite a few of them. But I do my best to give most tanks at least a nice background. And ofcourse a hiding place and water dish which is most important of all.
I'm planning to start planting a few of my enclosures. But I need to find some plant that can survive well in very low light conditions.

The vertical ones are for arboreal tarantulas. The others for the terrestrials.

P. irminia. Her hide is in the left back corner but is well camouflaged. She's build quite a tunnel. Her plant died, but it survived for more than a year so that's quite well.

Just busy cleaning this one out and preparing a new hide for the new inhabitant.

this is a terrestrial setup for an L. parahybana. Still need to paint her background and cave.

new enclosure for my A. versicolor. still needs a plant or something

Another simple terrestrial setup for a B. smithi

 

[pisspotgrower]

Thanks heeps for that mate, im sure they love there homes

As for ya plants, what kind of light ya using....cant see it be to hard get a few stretchy ladies running under few watts of cfl

 

[Boffin]

The enclosures hardly get any light. Spiders don't like light and putting a bulb above them will stress them out. They're kept in a very dim room.
Also invertebrates and cannibinoids don't go very well together (it's one of the plant's defense mechanisms against them) so I won't be putting any cannabis in there
The ones I had actually did quite well as it survived for more than a year and because of underwatering. I don't know the name of the plant though

 

[pisspotgrower]

Rk cool cool always learning round here thanks for ya replys mate

So how would u rate them to keep...like are they ahrd and alot of effort needed ( which i dont mind )....started doing researsh earlier.....lots to read

 

[Boffin]

they are probably some of the most low maintenance pets you can have and quite easy to keep compared to lots of other exotic animals.

they don't need much food (about once every 1-2 weeks). Just make sure there's always some water available.
Most species don't need any extra heating.
Humidity depends on species but lots of species can be kept relatively dry.

They are clean animals so as long as you remove leftovers from food and maybe spot clean some poop from the enclosures walls once in a while you probably won't need to change substrate for at least a year or two.

 

[gloryoskie]

I kept a B. smithie years ago. They are wonderful creatures.
I fed mine small lizards, she loved them.

As long as they are captive bred they remain most intersting
pets. Perhaps I will get back into it to breed them.

 

[Boffin]

yes it's very important to only keep captive bred specimens. That's also why I breed them.
There are some genera with very high numbers of wild caught specimens like aphonopelma, haplopelma, grammostola, avicularia, etc...

I'm actually planning to start focussing my breeding specifically on those kind of species instead of just breeding my favourites or the ones I happen to have a breeding couple of.

 

[Boffin]

well here's a quick pic of one of the M. balfouri. They are still small so they're not showing much adult coloration so far. (First hints of blue is visible on the legs)
Can't wait for them to grow up

 

[Boffin]

And a pretty Poecilotheria striata juvie