Checked on the Hottentotta today. The pudgy one molted, and the slender one died. No great surprise there.
I just hope that among the survivors I have at least one male / female pair that survives to adulthood. If I succeed and breed a second generation, I'm DEFINITELY setting up a hotbox for the young.
I checked on my limited tarantula collection -- one of my OBTs and my Avicularia versicolor both molted.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Long-awaited molts
Doing the rounds today I discovered that three of my five Hottentotta judaicus have FINALLY molted to third instar.
I got eight 2I that were born sometime in May of 2008; by July, three had died. None seemed to be putting on much weight and all were extremely skittish when disturbed, so I wasn't sure if they were even aware of prey when I introduced it. I didn't really know what was going on -- the person who sent them to me said they were hearty eaters.
I did know that I was probably keeping them too far on the cool side (they hail from Jordan, and my apartment doesn't get quite that warm) but other sources suggested they don't need to be kept under very hot conditions to do well.
Either way, when we moved the bugs into the bedroom for the winter I put all of them right next to the heater, where it's usually at least 80 degrees Fahrenheit. Now three have molted, one's fat and looking ready to molt, and one's still on the slender side.
I'd post pics, but the SLR is currently out of commission.
I got eight 2I that were born sometime in May of 2008; by July, three had died. None seemed to be putting on much weight and all were extremely skittish when disturbed, so I wasn't sure if they were even aware of prey when I introduced it. I didn't really know what was going on -- the person who sent them to me said they were hearty eaters.
I did know that I was probably keeping them too far on the cool side (they hail from Jordan, and my apartment doesn't get quite that warm) but other sources suggested they don't need to be kept under very hot conditions to do well.
Either way, when we moved the bugs into the bedroom for the winter I put all of them right next to the heater, where it's usually at least 80 degrees Fahrenheit. Now three have molted, one's fat and looking ready to molt, and one's still on the slender side.
I'd post pics, but the SLR is currently out of commission.
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