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If you've ever seen that old video of the bowhunter getting mauled by a buck after spraying himself with doe-in-heat urine, you'd understand.

Well, the medical benefits of handling tarantulas has finally been documented. http://www.foxnews.com/health/2012/05/22/spider-phobia-cured-with-2-hour-therapy/?intcmp=features

Mine is an uppity little whiner who is apparently still angry about the switch from crickets to dubias last year and is dead-set on bringing me to my knees with her peevish feeding habits.:confused: I need to get a life.:8o

I would recommend the GBB. Even arachnophobes 'ooh' and 'aah' over their colors. Unlike the experience of others, mine is not a great eater, but maybe that's because she is judged against her neighbors, an A. genic and L. parahybana.

Yep. They are quite charming, for spiders. My wife has grown to (sort of) love our parahybana.

I would get L. parahybana. My 8" A. genic turns into a pet rock the moment I get her out of enclosure, as did my previous A. genic. She will sit without moving for hours. My 8" parahybana is at least crawls around a little when I have her out. My chaco is only 3.5", so I don't handle her...

True, but so is bicoloratum.

I've never kept B. klassi, but A. bicoloratum is by far the slowest growing T I have ever seen. My 3.5" juvie molted one time in a year. Not very active, not a big eater, but she did stay out in the open a lot.

Since when did you stop being a jerk?:D I agree with you. Cupping is the way to go, unless you enjoy the feel of T. blondi venom coursing through your veins or want to see one eventually go splat. aracnophiliac, until it happens, you cannot believe how strong a T. blondi is when it...

Proof? Has anyone done a study on the morbidity and mortality of handled vs. non-handled captive T's? If so, I want to read it. My personal anecdotal experience is that handling T's goes a long way towards extinguishing their fight or flight reaction.

How would you feel if you checked into a hotel and spent the night on somebody's used sheets? Change the substrate and clean the tank.

Amen to that. My other blondi fell 5" out of her plastic palm tree onto the edge of her water bowl and died.:(

I agree with Rob and Matt. Just get her in a cup and get her on the floor before you try to handle her. I also would advise feeding her the day before. BTW, I handle mine without gloves, but she does make me itch a bit. Just be sure if she kicks a cloud of hairs they don't float into your...

The fine stuff actually allows for burrowing if you keep it moist. My H. gigas is doing well with it. I mix in activated charcoal in for the non-obligate burrowers.

While the blisters could be from capillary leakage secondary to vasodilation, my guess is, as someone has already pointed out, T venom (as opposed to Apis venom) has a digestive component, so the blisters are probably due a the "meat tenderizer" effect. As far as effects of spider venom in...

Of course it was a reaction to the venom. That's what venom does. However, it was not a hypersensitivity (ie allergic) reaction, since he did not have the typical symptoms of itching, hives, wheezing, hypotension, etc. As bad as it was, Rob's experience was rather typical for a severe Pokie...

I feel the need to point out that there is not a single documented instance of hypersensitivity to tarantula venom in the medical literature. In fact, the T venom molecules are probably too small to elicit a hypersensitivity response.

Careful there. These men are giants in their field. The word "legendary" comes to mind. :rolleyes:

Yes, but only as a 0.5. On a positive note, you and Rob have, in the last two months alone, singlehandedly advanced the world's knowledge base of spider envenomation more than all prior researchers' efforts combined. I'm nominating the two of you for the Nobel Prize in Medicine.

By my count, Rob's one up on you now, NB. You'd better stick that hand in your new communal enclosure and "get crackin' ". ;P