- Joined
- Mar 17, 2003
- Messages
- 939
I was just about to PM our own Jeff_C with a report on his male's breeding with my female, and figured I may as well post it publicly and just PM Mr. Cohen the link.
I've paired a bunch of Ceratogyrus recently and just hatched some more C. bechuanicus, and in each case the mating was pretty straightforward. Exactly like my past experience breeding the genus. In other words, what we expect - male drumming to entice the female, hopefully a female that drums back and comes out of hiding, and the subsequent courtship dance and, with any luck, a good insertion or three. However, in this case things were slightly different.
Jeff sent me his male at least three or four weeks ago, but I held off introducing him to the female for some time so I could get a few meals in him and hopefully discover evidence of a sperm web.
Starting a couple of weeks ago, I introduced the male into the cage with the large female that I recently posted photos of in the unofficial Jeff C picture thread when the discussion turned to the identity of the hobby's "C. brachycephalus". Every time he did not drum/tap at all. He basically just laid in a corner and, even when I tickled him with a paintbrush to get him to move toward the female's burrow and the silk mat in front that, presumably, would provide a mating stimulus, he did not seem to have any interest. After some time, I would remove him.
I should mention that the female is set-up in a manner to encourage burrowing. She doesn't quite disappear to the extent of a Haplopelma species, but she does spend most of the time in her hole. When she was out of it I tried introducing the male on several more occasions, but each time he did not tap and occasionally she would move toward him and the possibility of him getting attacked would cause me to cup him for protection.
I left the male and female alone (and separate) for the past ten days or so and just fed them each once. Today and tonight we have had severe thunderstorms, and as a firm believer in barometric pressure changes being a key to breeding many animals, I decided to pair many tarantulas and reptiles tonight.
I opened the female's cage and her abdomen was protruding out of the burrow mouth. In other words, she was facing into her burrow when I wished she was turned facing out. Still, I put the little male in her cage and hoped he would tap this time. He didn't. Ever. But the female turned around in the burrow and moved forward a few inches. The male was on the opposite end of the cage and as I tried to direct him towards her he ran out of the cage and I had to catch him. I then put him into her cage at a distance of about six inches. He did nothing, but the female started drumming. He seemed pretty oblivious (pardon my anthropomorphism) and her drumming intensified. She was drumming and drumming and he stayed still. She moved forward about two inches - a half inch or so at a time over about 30 seconds - all the while drumming. He began to stretch out and extend is pedipalps straight up, perpendicular to his body. He never tapped; he just flexed his body and stretched all his legs out and waved his pedipalps vertically. She moved closer and kept drumming until he finally approached her and they assumed a mating position. He got good inserts with both palps over about five seconds and then they broke apart. She struck towards him and he was quick enough to get a safe distance away. I was just about to remove him when the female started intensely drumming again. Before I knew it they were mating again and he had a little bit more time to get a couple more good inserts before they broke it off again. This time the female definitely tried to attack him and her chelicerae were separated and her fangs exposed. I began to cup the male and the female started drumming again! I was fascinated by her eagerness to mate and let him go back towards her and, for a third time, they mated successfully. And this time she was even more aggressive when he broke free and I thought he was "toast". He was quicker than she though... and now he is back in his own home. I don't have another female so I'll leave it up to Jeff whether he wants the male to go on to someone else with a female, or spend its retirement at the Spider Shoppe.
Cheers, Michael
PS - I did take photos, but unfortunately I had left my digital at home and had to use my film camera. It was out of film and the only roll I had left in my camera bag was slide film. So... it will be a few days to get slides made and the images transferred to disk.
I've paired a bunch of Ceratogyrus recently and just hatched some more C. bechuanicus, and in each case the mating was pretty straightforward. Exactly like my past experience breeding the genus. In other words, what we expect - male drumming to entice the female, hopefully a female that drums back and comes out of hiding, and the subsequent courtship dance and, with any luck, a good insertion or three. However, in this case things were slightly different.
Jeff sent me his male at least three or four weeks ago, but I held off introducing him to the female for some time so I could get a few meals in him and hopefully discover evidence of a sperm web.
Starting a couple of weeks ago, I introduced the male into the cage with the large female that I recently posted photos of in the unofficial Jeff C picture thread when the discussion turned to the identity of the hobby's "C. brachycephalus". Every time he did not drum/tap at all. He basically just laid in a corner and, even when I tickled him with a paintbrush to get him to move toward the female's burrow and the silk mat in front that, presumably, would provide a mating stimulus, he did not seem to have any interest. After some time, I would remove him.
I should mention that the female is set-up in a manner to encourage burrowing. She doesn't quite disappear to the extent of a Haplopelma species, but she does spend most of the time in her hole. When she was out of it I tried introducing the male on several more occasions, but each time he did not tap and occasionally she would move toward him and the possibility of him getting attacked would cause me to cup him for protection.
I left the male and female alone (and separate) for the past ten days or so and just fed them each once. Today and tonight we have had severe thunderstorms, and as a firm believer in barometric pressure changes being a key to breeding many animals, I decided to pair many tarantulas and reptiles tonight.
I opened the female's cage and her abdomen was protruding out of the burrow mouth. In other words, she was facing into her burrow when I wished she was turned facing out. Still, I put the little male in her cage and hoped he would tap this time. He didn't. Ever. But the female turned around in the burrow and moved forward a few inches. The male was on the opposite end of the cage and as I tried to direct him towards her he ran out of the cage and I had to catch him. I then put him into her cage at a distance of about six inches. He did nothing, but the female started drumming. He seemed pretty oblivious (pardon my anthropomorphism) and her drumming intensified. She was drumming and drumming and he stayed still. She moved forward about two inches - a half inch or so at a time over about 30 seconds - all the while drumming. He began to stretch out and extend is pedipalps straight up, perpendicular to his body. He never tapped; he just flexed his body and stretched all his legs out and waved his pedipalps vertically. She moved closer and kept drumming until he finally approached her and they assumed a mating position. He got good inserts with both palps over about five seconds and then they broke apart. She struck towards him and he was quick enough to get a safe distance away. I was just about to remove him when the female started intensely drumming again. Before I knew it they were mating again and he had a little bit more time to get a couple more good inserts before they broke it off again. This time the female definitely tried to attack him and her chelicerae were separated and her fangs exposed. I began to cup the male and the female started drumming again! I was fascinated by her eagerness to mate and let him go back towards her and, for a third time, they mated successfully. And this time she was even more aggressive when he broke free and I thought he was "toast". He was quicker than she though... and now he is back in his own home. I don't have another female so I'll leave it up to Jeff whether he wants the male to go on to someone else with a female, or spend its retirement at the Spider Shoppe.
Cheers, Michael
PS - I did take photos, but unfortunately I had left my digital at home and had to use my film camera. It was out of film and the only roll I had left in my camera bag was slide film. So... it will be a few days to get slides made and the images transferred to disk.
