Ally's Eight-Legged Journey

The mystery spider in the new labs has appeared yet again. And I have still completely failed to identify it. I can tell you it's a male, and that's as far as I have got. This time, I attempted to take a photograph of the spiders eye arrangement, but I was foiled by the angle that the spider was sitting on the doorframe, and the poor quality of my phone camera. I am waiting on a delivery of feeder insects this week. I have half a mind to go into the lab with a pair of forceps and offer the Mystery Spood something to eat. He may not eat, as mature males usually have only one thing on their minds, but I can try. If anyone more knowledgeable than me knows what kind of spider this might be, please comment to let me know! He is intriguing me.

Tyson. Tyson, Tyson, Tyson.... I love this little mantis - he is full of personality, he loves to eat, he loves to come out and be handled. I especially love that after I named him Tyson for his little boxing gloves, I discovered that he also likes to nibble me! So he boxes and he bites, and I love that he is just living up to his name in every way. Here he is giving my finger a little nibble. He likes to walk up my finger, nibbling as he goes. He is so small right now that I don't even feel it, but I do think it's incredibly cute. He moulted this week, for the first time since he got here. When Catchy molts, she looks significantly bigger each time, but that's not the case with Tyson. Maybe Tyson is just a slower growing species, but I didn't even realise he had moulted until I saw his shed skin lying on the floor. And since we're talking about mantids, I thought we might focus on Catchy for a little bit. Catchy is definitely a favourite invertebrate of m...

I am unsure whether I have mentioned this previously, but Poe - my Poecilotheria metallica - finally has a permanent name. He is now Ziggy, as in Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. It suits him somehow. At the moment, he is not a very active spider - he has built himself a little teepee and covered it in substrate to hide in, so he spends 90% of his time in there. He only really comes out when he's hungry, though I haven't managed to get a decent photograph of that yet. He has molted since he came home, and is currently sitting somewhere between 2 and 3 cm across, (diagonally) but I rarely see him stretched out as he likes to keep his legs in a distinctive position. The front four legs get stretched out in front, and the back 4 get stretched out in the back. It can be seen in this photo, where you can also see his red mouth and his fangs: Since going into his larger braplast, I've seen almost nothing of Lolth. He has dug himself a hole to hide in. I try to...

Fred, the Spooder prince is doing very well. Once I worked out that he was a fussy eater and only ate green bottles, he started thriving. He still hasn't built himself a molting hammock yet, and I'm starting to wonder if he ever will - it may be that he is a mature male already (although he seems a little small for that). At the moment I've taken to putting a caster into his food bowl as soon as they arrive, so that as soon as it hatches he can be on the prowl. He seems to like that. But he is exploring well, eating well, and getting used to being handled - although that really depends on what mood you catch him in. Like Wilma, he likes to disappear up my sleeves. I have bought him some additional decorations for his little house - A coffin to serve as a hide, and some resin skulls which I scattered around his enclosure to match his castle. I guess he is now the Spooder Prince of Darkness? I was able to get these cute little skulls from Etsy shop The Spooder Corner . ...

Lucifer is ALIVE! I had a vague inkling that he was, because he had kicked a moult out of his burrow not so long ago, but I hadn't actually seen *him* since putting him in the enclosure. Last night I went for a middle-of-the-night bathroom trip, and just out of curiosity I turned the spood light on. I was very pleased to discover that Lucifer was up and about, and feeding on a greenbottle that had hatched out in his enclosure a few days earlier. He is a lot smaller than I expected - he has only had one moult since coming home, but for some reason I had expected to see a more dramatic change. He is obviously slower growing than some of my other species (although this might be helped by him coming out to feed more often!) But I am just glad that he is alive, and I've actually seen him. Here is his butt. It was the best image I could get while he was feeding, unfortunately.

Look how fluffy she is!!! I've never seen a spider quite as fluffy as Wilma. Hairy, yes. But Wilma looks like a little dust bunnie, she's absolutely adorable. I am going to have to keep a very close eye on this one though, because she LOVES food. In one week, she ate 3 fruit flies and 2 green bottles, and then caught a third green bottle that had accidentally ended up in her enclosure when (presumably) the caster got mixed up in her substrate and not noticed. There hasn't been a single prey item that she has let pass her by. So I will have to watch her very closely to prevent over feeding and the same issues that faced Winnie. In this photo, she actually has THREE fruitflies in her fangs at once. She tried to catch a fourth, but it got away. Now that she is settled into her enclosure, her personality is coming out. She loves to eat, loves to explore, and she panics a lot less than Winnie did when she is handled. In fact, she likes to explore my hand, has tried to ...

Before I went out for the night on Saturday night, I decided to feed and water the spoods early. Catchy refused food, for only the second time since he arrived to my house. Since the last time he refused food I subsequently discovered that he had just molted, I let him be. And lo and behold, when I got back from London the following morning, there was a brand new moult hanging from the roof of his cage. I love seeing my critters after they molt - they get so much bigger and their markings change, so it's like getting a whole new critter every time. So on that note, here's Catchy in his brand new clothes.

Unfortunately, my largest original spood appears to be sick. Since I moved Anansi to the larger braplast tub, I have been having problems with retained humidity in his enclosure. He is a desert species, and while he need a certain amount of humidity to successfully molt, he does need mostly dry conditions. In his previous enclosure, I filled his water bowl to the point of overflowing so that it dampened the substrate around it, and that was all he needed. Since I moved him and I had to rehydrate a new block of dried coco fibre, the substrate just hasn't dried. I tried everything that I could think of - from wiping condensation away twice daily to putting him on a heat mat, and even mixing dry substrate in with the damp to try and spread the moisture out. But unfortunately, it didn't work fast enough and two nights ago I discovered a fine fuzzy mould growing on the surface of his substrate: Checking on Anansi, I found him to be sluggish and unresponsive. He didn't rea...

Not really a full post but a happy note - Lucifer the Evil has kicked a molt out of his burrow! Lucifer is my Feather leg baboon spider. He is the one I am most scared of because he is a species known for a very nasty bite - five days of excruciating pain, spasms, and muscle cramps. As such, I do very little poking around his enclosure. He gets fed, obviously, and misted daily. But I haven't poked around. So when the first thing he did on arrival was burrow into the ground and hide, I was somewhat frustrated. For six weeks, I have been throwing pre-killed meal worms into what effectively looks like an empty tank, and I can't be sure that he is eating them. So to see a molt having been evicted from his burrow is a success - it shows he is still alive, and hopefully thriving. It would be nice to see him at some point though...