Look at those little guys...

Stefan2209

Arachnodemon
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Thanks!

Adnan said:
Nice guy, Stefan! :)
Hi Adnan,

thanks for the kind words, but i have to admit, they belong to Lelle, as it´s (again) one of his bred....

Greetings,

Stefan
 

Stefan2209

Arachnodemon
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Of course!

Adnan said:
Well, Lelle is a nice guy too. {D
That´s not the only point about him: he knows how to breed some really nice looking and well-behaved Phoneutrias, that´s for sure!

By the way, congratulations to your new sack! Let the babies come again!

Greetings,

Stefan
 

Crotalus

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Stefan2209 said:
Hi Adnan,

thanks for the kind words, but i have to admit, they belong to Lelle, as it´s (again) one of his bred....

Greetings,

Stefan
Great to see that some made it :)
Good luck on the breeding!

/Lelle
 

blacktara

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Stefan2209 said:
That´s not the only point about him: he knows how to breed some really nice looking and well-behaved Phoneutrias, that´s for sure!

By the way, congratulations to your new sack! Let the babies come again!

Greetings,

Stefan
well behaved Phoneutrias? That's kind of an oxymoron isnt it?
 

Stefan2209

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Not quite...

blacktara said:
well behaved Phoneutrias? That's kind of an oxymoron isnt it?
Depends of your point of view: as i´ve kept several Phoneutria specimen some years ago i can compare their behaviour to the other specimen i´ve kept.

Back in the late 90´s i got a P. fera wc-female which was my first adult ever of this genus. As this was the Phoneutria which "got me into P.´s" every other spider of this genus i get is matched against that first female.

When i compare the nigriventers i got recently against that fera-female, well, the nigriventers are just calm and cosy like my chilean rose-hair T. Which of course doesn´t mean they can´t get aggressive!

I don´t take this for a species-thing, i just think captive-bred or at least captive-raised are much more adapted to human-surroundings. As i´m expecting a nigriventer wc-female next week, i´m really excited to see how she will behave in comparison to the two cb-specimen i had.

Would be very interested in experiences of the other Phoneutria-keeper here. Have you witnessed similarities to this?

Greetings,

Stefan
 

Crotalus

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They come in different "personalities" - some are more aggressive and skittish then others. And alot depends on day to day mood it seems.
Captive raised are for sure a bit more layed back then adult WC, I raised a number of juveniles and all of them seemed less aggressive then the most WC adult female. But theres just no way I would relax anyway no mattar how layed back they seems to be, they all got potential and in a blink of en eye they can be long gone ;)

/Lelle
 

blacktara

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A request

How about a video of one of you guys doing some enclosure maintainence

I mean, I'm picturing someone wearing a HAZMAT outfit ;P
 

blacktara

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An a silly question

that's partly in fun but partly not

What is the correct pleural form of Phoneutria?

Phoneutrias? Phoneutria? Phonuetriae? Phoneetria?

And what's a bunch of them called? A flock? A herd? A gaggle? A problem?

I hope y'all understand. These spiders are fascinating and this thread has been most informative. I'm having a little fun

Robert
 

Crotalus

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One Phoneutria , many Phoneutria. You never add "s" after a genus name.
A bunch is called "lucky" ;)

/Lelle
 

Adnan

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Crotalus said:
Captive raised are for sure a bit more layed back then adult WC, I raised a number of juveniles and all of them seemed less aggressive then the most WC adult female.
My CB specimens, even the youngers, have more attitude than the adult WC ones. The WC ones are far more recluse, only appears at night and go hide when disturbed. So almost no warning displays. The CB ones wander at daylight and dont care about human-surroundings. They show the warning display with almost no reason...
 

Stefan2209

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Interesting!

Hey guys,

thanks for your replies!

I take this for really interesting, as i came to some different experiences:

the wc-fera female i had was of all P.´s i´ve kept so far the most aggressive ever. On one ocassion she was already pissed off by me just entering the room where her enclosure was in. She made several jumps against the door of the tank and stayed in thread-mode for something like 15 minutes.
On several other times she went in thread-display just because i was watching her. Maintanence on that one was, well, to say the least quite interesting.... Used to give her a cricket before i did cleaning or what else needed to be done. When she was feeding she used to be quite occupied with it and was harder to disturb.

Kept several juvi and spiderling specimen of nigriventer and keyserlingii (remember, this was in the lare 90´s) too. The smaller specimen had generally been much more calm than the adult female. When they went to thread-display it seemed more than a show-off to me than a real aggressive behaviour. As soon as i gave the glass of the tank a subtle knock they´d run and hide, the adult one just used to attack when i did this with her.

Compared to other ctenids i found this strange "show-off" behaviour once again with the real calm and harmless Cupiennius spec. While adult specimen are really cosy spiders, i saw it once with a male C. coccineus juvi. The lil fella went in full Phoneutria-style thread-mode when i filled up his water-dish. I was quite startled at first sight as i had never seen this before on a Cupiennius. Have to admit that i was not too impressed, rather embarrassed about that attitude. Gave him a little touch with the tip of my index finger at his fore-legs and he just ran and hide. Guess with some juvi-spiders it´s quite similar to human-kids sometimes they just have to test how far they can go... {D

@Blacktara:

Sorry, but i think a video of a standard-maintanence procedure would be a big let-down for you. What do think what security-measures are needed to work with these spiders?

In my opinion just some experiences with other spiders, preferably hunting-spiders, and some common-sense. That´s it. There are no special Phoneutria-proof suits to wear, there are no special courses to attend "how to keep P.´s" and there´s no ampoule of antivenin ready to shoot next to the tank. Whenever i have to do something inside the enclosure i just watch the spider for some minutes and if it seems just calm i do what i have to. Do it quick and do it careful. If the spider seems agitated do it later.
I´m not really afraid to get tagged though, my bigger concern is just the spider making a run for it and escapes. Come to the name Phoneutria there´s often talk bout the aggression this spiders can show. What is really underpronounced in my opinion is that even the bad-ass Phoneutria is most of the time quite peaceful and calm, as you long as you leave them be.

Greetings,

Stefan
 

jeroen

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Are you prepared for the worst case scenario (ie: in case you do get tagged badly?).

I think Phoneutria are amazing creatures, they demand respect and look awesome. I'm not sure if I ever want to keep one, just because there's always that very slight risc something goes wrong, and I wouldn't know what to do. I use to have some jumpy T's (pookeys, OBT, etc) and while I've never been tagged by those (I didn't handle them), I had my Ornata escape on me twice (once litterally on me, the second time she somehow managed to exit the enclosure...I think she teleported out of there :) I found her resting comfortably on my wall).
 

blacktara

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Stefan

My comment about the HAZMAT outfit was of course in jest - but here's why I'm curious

You yourself in the space of one post say - "Whenever i have to do something inside the enclosure i just watch the spider for some minutes and if it seems just calm i do what i have to. Do it quick and do it careful."

But that's not long after you comment about your wild child Fera that "Maintanence on that one was, well, to say the least quite interesting...."

In other words, the problem was that you couldnt watch and see if it was calm because apparently it hardly ever was. I'm curious. I still havent seen the National Geographic episode with Lelle's spiders

What Im really curious about is the speed of these spiders. I have heard it described, but seeing beats any description. Having my first T, I will now have something to gauge it against

The T I have is A brockelhursti - if someone asked me to describe its speed, I'd say it's modestly quick when it wants to be, which isnt often. So I wanna see what supersonic is in comparison to what I have seen in my T
 

Adnan

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jeroen said:
Are you prepared for the worst case scenario (ie: in case you do get tagged badly?)
Yes! The Butantan Institute is about 30 minutes from my home! ;)

I think Phoneutria are amazing creatures, they demand respect and look awesome. I'm not sure if I ever want to keep one, just because there's always that very slight risc something goes wrong, and I wouldn't know what to do. I use to have some jumpy T's (pookeys, OBT, etc) and while I've never been tagged by those (I didn't handle them), I had my Ornata escape on me twice (once litterally on me, the second time she somehow managed to exit the enclosure...I think she teleported out of there :) I found her resting comfortably on my wall).
You are lucky! My juv. H. maculata male escaped and I never saw him again! :(
 

Adnan

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Stefan2209 said:
Compared to other ctenids i found this strange "show-off" behaviour once again with the real calm and harmless Cupiennius spec. While adult specimen are really cosy spiders, i saw it once with a male C. coccineus juvi. The lil fella went in full Phoneutria-style thread-mode when i filled up his water-dish. I was quite startled at first sight as i had never seen this before on a Cupiennius. Have to admit that i was not too impressed, rather embarrassed about that attitude. Gave him a little touch with the tip of my index finger at his fore-legs and he just ran and hide. Guess with some juvi-spiders it´s quite similar to human-kids sometimes they just have to test how far they can go... {D
{D {D {D
 

Adnan

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wOohOo said:
hmm Adnan!! :D
www = small place man!!


I'm waiting for my Armadeiras (P. negriventer) spiderlings ehehehehehehee
See ya!
Hi Higuti! Glad do see you here!
Are you ready for Phoneutria? :)
 

Stefan2209

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Not far off...

blacktara said:
My comment about the HAZMAT outfit was of course in jest - but here's why I'm curious

You yourself in the space of one post say - "Whenever i have to do something inside the enclosure i just watch the spider for some minutes and if it seems just calm i do what i have to. Do it quick and do it careful."

But that's not long after you comment about your wild child Fera that "Maintanence on that one was, well, to say the least quite interesting...."

In other words, the problem was that you couldnt watch and see if it was calm because apparently it hardly ever was. I'm curious. I still havent seen the National Geographic episode with Lelle's spiders

What Im really curious about is the speed of these spiders. I have heard it described, but seeing beats any description. Having my first T, I will now have something to gauge it against

The T I have is A brockelhursti - if someone asked me to describe its speed, I'd say it's modestly quick when it wants to be, which isnt often. So I wanna see what supersonic is in comparison to what I have seen in my T

Hi Robert,

for some south-american countries you may not be so far off the money with that HAZMAT outfit. A colleague whose origin is Argentinia told me once the workers in the banana-plantages use to wear some kind of bee-worker outfit as a protection against Phoneutria... Donno if this true, but an interesting anecdote nevertheless...

Even the highly-aggressive fera-female had it´s times when it was rather calm, you just couldn´t trust that as she was lightning-quick in changing her mood... Over the time i came up with some procedures that worked for her. Misting the tank was done through the ventilation-holes of her enclosure. When i wanted to insert a cricket into her tank i used to work with "masks", pieces of cardbox which i cutted to fit the door of her tank and only left open a small opening around an inch. Then i put a cricket into a small plastic-box and hold the box in front of the small opening. So the cricket could enter the tank but there was no way how the spider would have been able to get out.
When i wanted to take something out of her tank (waterdish, prey-remainings), i used to feed her before that. When this spiders are eating they´re really occupied and very hard to disturb. In my experience they don´t care much what´s going on around them, as long as don´t get too near to them .

The speed of this spiders is their greatest risk in my opinion. You can watch them move all day and come to the conclusion "ok, they´re fast, but other spiders are too, so what". Most of the time they´re just slow, even when they´re hunting. That´s the real problem, they don´t show their maximum speed most of the time...
I kept the afformentioned fera for 6 months before she showed her real-speed to me for the first time. I came near to being afraid of her when i realízed she had just done several rounds in her tank without me even seeing moving... I just heard some noise and she sat at the opposite wall, i can´t even remember to have seen as much as a blurry movement, she just sat still at another location, talk about quick.

In my experience it´s quite rare that they move with that pervert-speed, but already the thought that they´re able to do it is discomforting when you have to open the tank...

Greets,

Stefan
 
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