Mystery Unboxing

Wow. I am a very happy spood keeper. I have got home, and transferred all of my spoods into their new homes. Because of sizing, I did not have enough Braplast tubs to rehouse all of the original spoods, so Shelob remains unhoused. But as she is the smallest of the three, she can wait another molt or so.

Heterometrus laoticus

We might as well start with the biggest surprise. This was a difficult critter to transfer. I was unprepared for a scorpion - I don't keep scorpions at all, and nothing I own has gotten big enough for me to have spare enclosures hanging around or anything, so I had to use what was available to me and borrow an enclosure from work. It's not really suitable - it doesn't have cross ventilation and it's not wide enough - but I have since ordered a glass terrarium from TSS and he will be rehoused again once it arrived. Fortunately, I had enough cork bark and substrate hanging around that I was able to throw a house together, and I can refine it later on. He has a heat mat under one half of his tank, as I wasn't able to stick it to the back. Hopefully he will have enough room to move around and cool down. I think I am going to name him Diablo.

I was terrified getting him out of the pot - I wasn't sure how angry he might have been at being stuck in there for 24 hours. As it was, I used a pair of forceps to pull his whole tissue out of the tub with him inside it, and he just sat there while I rolled him around to let him out. He wasn't nearly as angry as I expected (though he had been chewing on his tissue) so maybe Diablo isn't quite the right name for him, but it seems to be sticking so far. I am very happy to have him though. and I hope he will settle in. I currently keep him on my desk, separate from my spoods.

Lasiodora parahybana

Meet Incy Wincy. The funny thing is, when i got Joy I wanted to name her Incy Wincy. but my daughter objected. she wanted to name her, and so she became Joy. Because of this, when I saw that I had a second L. parahybana I knew I was going to name him Incy Wincy. What I didn't know was just how big this Incy Wincy was going to be! Joy is a sling, somewhere between 1 and 2 cm across. This spood, is inches across. I'm not sure at what point a spood stops being a sling and starts being a juvenile, but I suspect this is it. He is massive! Well, comparatively. Because of how big he is, there was no way that I could have put him in a sling box - he needed one of the Braplast tubs - and that is why Shelob hasn't been transferred.

Weirdly enough, despite being the largest spood in my collection so far, he does not trigger my phobia. At all.

Creboter sp. Yunnan

The Yunnan flower mantis. This one doesn't have a name yet - I have told my daughter that she can name him, as she did Catchy. I did not remove this mantis as I think he might be a bit small to be in a larger arboreal box. Once he has molted a couple of times, I will put him in a terrarium like Catchy has. I did throw some flightless fruit flies into his tub though. so he has some food.

In terms of invertebrates, I definitely got more than the £30 paid for the mystery box, and it was very exciting to unpack. I wish I had the space to order more, or maybe one of the larger boxes. I will do one day, but as you can see - my shelf is very full right now. I definitely recommend doing it though, assuming you have the space and supplies.

As well as the mystery box, my delivery today also included two species that I did deliberately order.

Caribena versicolor

This guy doesn't have a name either yet, as with the mantis, I have allowed my daughter to name him. Unless I think of a name first that is. Unboxing him was pretty simple, though he was pretty active and he did try to escape. He's currently hanging out upside down on the side of his enclosure. He is blue, though the photo doesn't show it. I can't wait to see him change into his adult colours.

Phidippus regius

My female jumping spider. I was a bit apprehensive about unboxing her because of the potential for her to look like Winnie, so I left her til last. And she does. But also... she doesn't. Winnie was more of a mocha brown, with ginger. And while Winona is brown and orange, her brown is darker and her orange is brighter. Obviously this may change with subsequent molts, but right now I am glad of the differences. I can't see what colour her chelicerae are right now, but her pedipalps are much fluffier than Winnies were. She was a very easy rehousing - I had previously cleaned up Winnie's enclosure, and was able to put her straight into there. She had molted in transit though, so I literally just put her whole tissue into the new home - I didn't want to touch or disturb her in any way. I'm looking forward to getting to know her personality.