Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
I’m a Tarantula Nerd
Hey, there’s a reason I chose Tarantula Lady as my ID.
A week ago, I posted that I would try to mate a pair of my Avicularia metallica tarantulas. The female was throwing up, however. I’m serious, tarantulas throw up sometimes. I was concerned she was ill (no, she did not have morning sickness), so I postponed their date. Well, they just did the deed and we saw the male got in some inserts. I took him out and he’s cleaning himself off at the moment. I’ll probably put them together in a week or so; this will give him a chance to recharge his bulbs with sperm.
Want a detailed explanation of the mating process? Go to Arachnopets.com.
Goody, more web porn! 😉
(Kind of interesting, actually.)
It’s a weirdly addictive hobby. Some tarantulas are very large and colorful and have interesting behavior, i.e. mating rituals, feeding habits, etc.
Tarantula owners come from very different backgrounds but 100% are independent thinkers. Almost all of us are atheists and left-wing/libertarians and we despise Bush’s policies. We’re also very polite to each other and usually avoid flame wars.
We may get called a bunch of “wackos” but we behave much better than most other internet groups. I think it’s because we’re independent thinkers who don’t blindly accept the hatred and prejudice in society.
K,
For what it’s worth…
The more I become interested/emotionally invested in animals, the more I feel connected to humanity.
J.
If you hadn’t mentioned the throwing-up I wouldn’t of ask this (for fear of sounding daft!) but will you be able to tell if she’s pregnant?
It’s hard to tell. The female will tend to lose interest (and tolerance) for the male. Usually, the female eats more and her abdomen gets fatter. Beyond that, your guess is as good as mine. The period between mating and egg-laying can vary anywhere from two weeks to two years, depending on the species.
…TWO YEARS? Wow! Does their body put the pregnancy on hold, or does the gestation really take that long?
I think I’ll have to get off my lazy backside and do some googling, I might not like them, but spiders are interesting!
The females just hang on to the sperm until they judge that the conditions are right to lay the eggs. Then she spins her eggsac and puts in the eggs and sperm; that’s when fertilization takes place. Spiders have been around for 400 million years which makes them one of the oldest land animals on earth. They have some very good evolutionary adaptations.
BTW, there’s a lot of female tarantula owners out there. I suspect it’s related to the fact that female spiders are much bigger, more aggressive, live longer, and scare the living hell out of the males.