# getting into the Calisoga longitarsus game again!



## cacoseraph (Jul 29, 2010)

i am about to get a mature female C. longi' and i really really REALLY want to get this species established in the hobby this time around! (due to living situation a couple/few years back i had to get rid of virtually all my bugs, including the two (or three?) species of Calisoga i collected on an awesome bug trip)


i was wondering who else keeps them? 


i am also looking for mature males for purchase, trade, or 50/50













(note:  *techinically* this spider is known as Brachythele longitarsus... but that just plain doesn't make sense and a worker needs to fix it)

Reactions: Like 1


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## cacoseraph (Jul 29, 2010)

it appears males can mature in about 2 years then, possibly a bit less. *i would guess that means a female could be mature in maybe 3-5 years, grown the same way. *which means about a 10-15 year life span, grown the same way 

so i would guess they can do about 20 years in nature, if they are lucky 

VERY rough extrapolations, of course  

they do seem to be somewhat substantiated by other captive experiences... i.e. having mature females live 3+ years in captivity 





man, that actually makes me pretty happy. if they grew *a bit faster i wold be a bit happier... but i am well pleased with that. *they grow quick enough that if we do things right we could have a good amount of breedable, beautiful mature females in 4-6 years. *that's not so very bad. *some of the dang local tarantulas roughly double all those time values i gave 


oh man! * if everyone is very careful we might be able to selectively breed them to be faster growing! *it would be pretty easy... everyone who wants to play along at home would just need to track how fast their various slings mature... and we would just breed all the fastest maturing together. *then we can line breed the fastest maturing male from the first round of selective breeding back to his mom to hopefully lock in those fast growing genes. a bit more play like that and i bet we could get males that mature in 1.25 or 1.5 years by the third generation. *we might even be able to compress that down to a year by the fifth or sixth generation if we are lucky. *once we have fast growing spiders we can then breed for color or size and not have to wait 20 years to do 4 or 5 female generations. 


of course, we would have to be careful to cull out any spiders who manifest goofiness or ugliness =P


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## recluse (Jul 29, 2010)

Last time i checked John Apple was keeping these.


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## bluefrogtat2 (Jul 29, 2010)

i currently have 5 sub adults i have been raising for years.
getting ready to trade them out this week.
andy


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## Steven (Jul 29, 2010)

not keeping them, but as you might remember , would loooove to get some of those,... very nice looking spiders tmo 

good luck in breeding them and getting them into the hobby


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## cacoseraph (Jul 29, 2010)

heh, hi Steven. good to see you 



right on. i am hoping to drum up interest in these amazing spiders.  i am really uncomfortable with how our hobby has pillaged out some bugs and i would like to take a bit of control in providing a species guaranteed to have been collected in a fairly conscientious manner and provide 100 reasonably priced captive produced spiders for every 1 WC on the market.  obviously that is going to take at least ~5 years or so to have a hope of doing... but i think it is a worthwhile effort


this is a nice species to try it on, too, because there are probably millions over a fairly huge range in CA so we have a bit of leeway when it comes to establishing our breeding base and restocking the ol' genepool


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## proper_tea (Jul 29, 2010)

:clap::clap::clap:

I love these spiders.  Unfortunately, my last longitarsus just passed.  I still have a theventi that is thriving.  I'll be looking forward to your breeding.  Don't know if you know josh_r, but he as bred these before.  I got my slings from him.  They are super slow growers.


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## cacoseraph (Jul 29, 2010)

yeah, josh is who i collected my original spiders with. hell of a bugman.




well, it is very interesting... i have seen ppl say they grow really slow and fairly fast.  that could be a range thing (we collected them over like 150-200 mile range) or a care conditions thing.  will be fun to find out


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## Chris_Skeleton (Jul 29, 2010)

Well if you do breed them and want to ship a couple my way  I'll track how fast they grow.


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## mitchrobot (Jul 31, 2010)

good luck with your project, id love to see these and theveneti in the hobby some day. id be interested in checking out some slings, ive never seen any ever, always just MMs or big females. i currently only keep one. Al Wolf from the sonoma county reptile rescue has hands down the BIGGEST one of these i have ever seen, its is monstrous and must be old as the hills. 

i just opened my girls sac and it was ALL rotten :barf:. this is year 3 that ive failed to get slings with this species. my girl molts almost the same time every year. captive breeding info isnt all too common, but i think i kept her cage too moist...

if you're ever near Navarro send me a PM, i know a road that is lousy with these . catching them in an entirely different thing than finding them though haha. i kid you not there is hundreds, but their burrows are deep and go almost straight down, i failed in flooding any out.  theres also a 'reddish' colored type i found near the fort bragg area. looks like longitarsis but more of a rusty/silver color rather than the silver/silver color


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## mdkelty (Jul 31, 2010)

Calisoga Longitarsus is one of my favorites!  I too would like to see them more established in the hobby.  I have one immature female and two 3/4 inch slings and would like to get more.  I'll be seeing John Apple today, (friend of mine). I'll ask him if he has any or where to get more.


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## John Apple (Aug 2, 2010)

I keep them...yes I do...I have two adult female longi's and two adult thevenetti's...and one that makes me go 'what the heck is that'
got a few sacs of each and I distributed them in the hobby...but that may have only been a few hundred of each...Andrew I am also looking for males so if ya got some send them to me and I'll pay postage...or you Cali folk that find them in a pool still alive....
these guys make a very cool hammock style sac that they guard very well


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## recluse (Aug 3, 2010)

John Apple said:


> I keep them...yes I do...I have two adult female longi's and two adult thevenetti's...and one that makes me go 'what the heck is that'
> got a few sacs of each and I distributed them in the hobby...but that may have only been a few hundred of each...Andrew I am also looking for males so if ya got some send them to me and I'll pay postage...or you Cali folk that find them in a pool still alive....
> these guys make a very cool hammock style sac that they guard very well



Hey John, Hans here, unfortunately the one you gave me died, would like to get more sometime.


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## mitchrobot (Aug 3, 2010)

John Apple, do you by chance have a pic of the one that makes you wonder? or where about it was from(south, central or north Ca)?

are these only found in california? 

aside from the rust colored ones, in Albion Ca (near fort bragg) i found a MM of a very similar spider. couldnt for the life of me locate a burrow or anything similar to it. it had hooks and boxing gloves, but was about a third the size of a calisoga MM, black legs, reddish body. this thing wasnt bald and glossy, but fuzzy/metallic like calisoga. 

im going to go....uh...see if i can liberate a few local girls this weekend from their burrows and into new homes...
i find the MMs at all times of the year, if i can manage to find one ill keep in touch. breeding projects ftw.


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## cacoseraph (Aug 3, 2010)

i pulled what seemed to be a brownish species that lived alongside the thevenetii in mariposa county, CA.  lost track of them in my diaspora

there is at least one species of Calisoga (centrognatha or centroetha or something like that) that has been described that we don't know about.  there is likely at least one species undescribed, too


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## Bill S (Nov 13, 2010)

As I type this I've got a pair of _Calisoga longitarsus_ breeding.  I got them both as tiny babies about two years ago, and both matured very recently.  (Got them from John Apple, I think.)  My question now is - anyone know how soon I'm likely to see an egg sac?  Will it be produced during the winter (ignoring seasons due to captivity), or is the female likely to hold out until Spring?  I light the room pretty much matching natural day length patterns, and the room runs in the high 60s during the winter, around 80 during the summer.  What's the typical range in the number of babies produced?

Pretty cool spiders.  I got them as freebies along with an order of tarantulas, hadn't really thought about keeping them or breeding them - but have grown to like them.  Mine are pretty much pet holes, except that the holes were up against the side of the KK so I was always able to see them.  Upon maturing, though, the male started hanging out on the surface.  Probably wanting to go cruising for females.


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## MadTitan (Nov 17, 2010)

I approve of this game, but where does one get the playing pieces?


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## proper_tea (Nov 17, 2010)

MadTitan said:


> I approve of this game, but where does one get the playing pieces?


Huh?

I mean, I'm glad you resurrected this thread, because I really want an update on everyone's Calisoga projects.... but huh?  What are you talking about?

Anyway, how's everyone's breeding project going?  I really want to pick up some slings at some point.  I miss my Calisogas.  Hope you all are still working on making this possible.


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## Draiman (Nov 17, 2010)

proper_tea said:


> Huh?
> 
> I mean, I'm glad you resurrected this thread, because I really want an update on everyone's Calisoga projects.... but huh?  What are you talking about?


Notice the thread title says, _"getting into the Calisoga longitarsus *game* again"_?

Quite obviously, he's asking where he can get himself some of these spiders.


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## JimM (Nov 17, 2010)

proper_tea said:


> Huh?
> 
> I mean, I'm glad you resurrected this thread, because I really want an update on everyone's Calisoga projects.... but huh?  What are you talking about?
> 
> Anyway, how's everyone's breeding project going?  I really want to pick up some slings at some point.  I miss my Calisogas.  Hope you all are still working on making this possible.


Seems pretty self explanatory to me...he wants to know where he can obtain this species.


I collected and kept them when I lived down in California years ago. Neat little critter. We called them "Pygmy Grey Tarantulas" back in the day.
Mean as any baboon spider, and worth establishing in the hobby.


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## JimM (Nov 17, 2010)

On a side note we have an interesting little mygalomorph up this way in the Pacific Northwest, Antrodiaetus pacificus. I find a few males walking around every year, but have yet to locate a female.


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## JimM (Nov 17, 2010)

Bill S said:


> Mine are pretty much pet holes, except that the holes were up against the side of the KK so I was always able to see them.


I dug a female out of a 6' burrow along a hillside once.
Every other time it was just getting lucky, finding burrows that were dug against a rock that could be lifted.


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## MadTitan (Nov 17, 2010)

Yep, that's what I was asking.  I had a feeling the answer was go to California, or keep waiting for someone to post slings on FS/T.



JimM said:


> Seems pretty self explanatory to me...he wants to know where he can obtain this species.
> 
> 
> I collected and kept them when I lived down in California years ago. Neat little critter. We called them "Pygmy Grey Tarantulas" back in the day.
> Mean as any baboon spider, and worth establishing in the hobby.


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## MadTitan (Nov 17, 2010)

I imagine a burrow entrance look just like any other leaf in the forest.  I did not know we had those around here.



JimM said:


> On a side note we have an interesting little mygalomorph up this way in the Pacific Northwest, Antrodiaetus pacificus. I find a few males walking around every year, but have yet to locate a female.


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## John Apple (Nov 17, 2010)

Bill...from my experiences...the female will make a sac about 30 days after breeding and heavy feeding...they make a hammock style sac and guard it by running around over and under it...these will eat when guarding a sac


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## JimM (Nov 17, 2010)

MadTitan said:


> I imagine a burrow entrance look just like any other leaf in the forest.  I did not know we had those around here.


Yep, and in WA as a whole, one or two other undescribed Antrodiaetus species as well.

I find a few males in the house every year. The first one reared up and gave me a threat display. I think you're right about the burrows. Once in a while I try and go digging around for them, but no luck so far.


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## Bill S (Nov 18, 2010)

John Apple said:


> Bill...from my experiences...the female will make a sac about 30 days after breeding and heavy feeding...they make a hammock style sac and guard it by running around over and under it...these will eat when guarding a sac


Thank you John.  That was the information I was hoping to get.


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## proper_tea (Nov 18, 2010)

JimM said:


> Seems pretty self explanatory to me...he wants to know where he can obtain this species.


Ah... gotcha.  

Yeah... I'm totally on the lookout for these spiders too.  I had a couple females, and some slings that I got from josh_r.  We moved, and I didn't realize how much more sunlight our new spider room got than our old one.  On the first day that the temperatures got into the mid-90s, all of my longitarsii died.  Interestingly enough, my theventi is doing great.

I'm thinking of posting an add next summer to see if I can get someone to go out and collect a few for me.  I'd like to breed these as well, even if I have to give the slings away... just to try to better establish them in the hobby.


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## cacoseraph (Nov 20, 2010)

at some point the next year i should be getting up to NoCA.  there are a few ppl up there who do collect them from time, too, that might make that unnecessary (though always a pleasure)


someone asked about catching them?


well, here is a little dealie i wrote up to remind *me* how to catch them =P

Catching Calisoga
http://scabies.myfreeforum.org/about3564.html


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## cacoseraph (Feb 13, 2011)

well, so far so good.  i got a male from www.kenthebugguy.com and once he and my female seemed like they were settled in and ready to go i introduced them.  the male quickly started body bobbing and a little tapping and then wandered around until he found the females burrow.  he actually then lured her out and they mated with her half in/half out of her burrow entrance.  the male did some trance dance and then went for the close clutch and got some inserts in. they stayed close for ~5 minutes and then he started retrancing her. i thought it might be to make his escape but it was actually to go in for more inserts.  then i bumped the cage and he separated and i removed him.  going to wait a couple few days and let them each have a meal before trying again 

this species has always been easy to mate in my experience. i believe this is around my sixth pairing between 3-4 females and 3 males and there has never been any grief






zoom --> http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b287/cacoseraph/mygla/calisoga/mating/110212gooddetail01b.jpg

also, i shot some vid and am going to try to get some more and more pics the next time i mate them... so i should have a youtube presently


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## cacoseraph (Mar 24, 2011)

female, with food













zoom -> http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b287/cacoseraph/mygla/calisoga/withfood02b.jpg






zoom -> http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b287/cacoseraph/mygla/calisoga/withfood03b.jpg
zoomer -> http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b287/cacoseraph/mygla/calisoga/withfood03c.jpg






zoom -> http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b287/cacoseraph/mygla/calisoga/withfood04b.jpg


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## neubii18 (Mar 24, 2011)

Nice!How big do these guys get!?


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## cacoseraph (Mar 24, 2011)

my female is mature and around 3.5"DLS

a big female can get to 4"DLS and so can some males. MM are like tarantulas and much more leggy than females








that's roughly to scale looking


also, the colors you see here are much closer to what they look like in "real" life.  the flash is what makes them so sliver and crazy looking in some pics.  kinda like most tarantula/like bugs


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## Moltar (Mar 25, 2011)

Byooteeful. They're bigger than I thought, too.


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## zonbonzovi (Mar 25, 2011)

Best of luck, Caco.  I was thinking about this the other day and wondered if you had made any headway.


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## Irene B. Smithi (Mar 26, 2011)

That's an impressive spider! :clap:


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## cacoseraph (Mar 26, 2011)

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b287/cacoseraph/mygla/calisoga/firstfreehandle01b.jpg



she was tricky, consequently i learned new tricks for free handling.

i felt i had to step up the "fear response" detuning because anything touching the spider would freak it out... so i tried to see if there was like, a minimum threshold for what she reacted to. *as it turns out, i could pull a hair out of my head and run it along her as much as i wanted and she wouldn't react. *that's... kinda almost the definition of hair trigger... but hey, it's a place to start. *i cut strips of paper about 6" long and 1/4" wide. the final 1-2" tapered down to nothing. *i used that to stroke Agatha (i just named her, bonus points for the first person to say why it's ~funny) and found if i lightly stroked her she wouldn't go full threat, but would react. *any pressure behind the petting and she would full threat. * roughly every other day i would spend at least 5-10 minutes petting her like this. *i found i could put more pressure on her legs and less on her body. *i found i could even lift her feet if and move them, if i was very slow and gentle. *

eventually she responded less and less to the same stimuli and had the original reactions to increased stimuli. *i still can't touch her with anything but thin paper in her cage... but i can use it to move her around. sort of negative stimulating her away from my proddings with it. *once she gets to a corner she will try to move her body away from the prod and try to climb up the walls... at this point i can get her on me by switching to a solid prod and levering her... but eventually she should just walk on to me like all the others before her =P

i would say she is now, in her detuned state, as reactive as most of the (near)adult Pokies i have played with. *i think i can probably detune her some more, but i think there is a limit to what i can do. *you can only bend something's nature so much before you break it. *however, if i could selectively breed all the least reactive spiders together... but i'd much rather breed for crazy colors in them, by far!


oh, btw i'd say my girl is right around 3.25"DLS for all that it is a silly measurement


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## What (Mar 26, 2011)

cacoseraph said:


> *i think i can probably detune her some more, but i think there is a limit to what i can do. *you can only bend something's nature so much before you break it. *however, if i could selectively breed all the least reactive spiders together... but i'd much rather breed for crazy colors in them, by far!


Totally unsupported theory about this behavior: California mygs like this might have an ability to adapt to seasonal grasses, we only really have an abundance of green foliage that would move a lot with wind during part of our year, perhaps this behavior is a natural mechanism for distinguishing prey from environment?

And...this thread reminds me I need to stop being such a flake and get buthus his bugs back...and Scary Mary back to you.


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## cacoseraph (Mar 26, 2011)

i owe you a dinner or something, for sure!




i think most bugs can select out "noise" stimuli that don't have anything to do with actual danger or prey.   they would like, break otherwise, i think.


so i definitely think there is some merit to your theory


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## cacoseraph (Mar 27, 2011)

*My Silver Spiders - Calisoga longitarsus*

[YOUTUBE]A0nb62ll4UI[/YOUTUBE]

My Silver Spiders - Calisoga longitarsus

Calisoga longitarsus (technically known as Brachythele longitarsus due to a taxonomy error long in the past) are members of the family Nemesiidae, which is not too distantly related to Theraphosidae, the tarantula family.

Adult females range from about 3-4" (8-10cm) diagonal legspan. Adult males can approach this legspan, but are a much lighter build. Some adult males are considerably smaller than females, around 1/8 their weight. In salubrious conditoins in captivity males can mature in under 2 years (and die well under 3 years) and females can mature in under 3 years and live to around 10 years. In nature all these times are probably doubled (with long lifespans to lucky females).

Adult females and near adults of both sexes are typically very quick to present a threat display. They will bite a careless owner, but one (nice) functional difference between these spiders and tarantulas is that these spiders do not have enough sticky pads on their feet to climb vertical smooth surfaces, like glass. This makes managing sometimes crabby spiders much easier!

The coloration of these spiders is particularly interesting. In most light conditions they are essentially brown, with only hints of their metallic colors. In the right kinds of bright light, like a camera flash and some natural and room lighting they show off much more dramatic effects. They become silver with baby blue highlights and rainbow iridescense. The babies start out a sort of translucent white color and do not gain this adult coloration until they are around half grown. Even then, the enhanced coloration is most apparent in adults. Mature females and males display full enhancement, contrary to a lot of other "fancy" mygalomorph/tarantula species.

Thanks for watching.


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## Nomadinexile (Mar 28, 2011)

edited after research.

Hey Caco, 
I'm in NorCal apparently in C. longitarsus habitat.  I'm going to be collecting scorpions in the area in the next few days, and will keep an eye out for these.   Unfortunately I don't have any digging tools, so will have to get lucky and find them in scrapes.  

Are you still lookig for just males?  Or are you interested in both m/f?

Peace, ~r


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## Rob1985 (Mar 28, 2011)

would anyone happen to have a female fore sale? :}


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## cacoseraph (Mar 28, 2011)

Nomad, i would be interested in both, depending. we'll pm


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## John Apple (Mar 29, 2011)

Nomad i would also be interested....do you come across any thevenetti and the third dwarf or smaller sp.....I need males also.....the male i thought was did not accomplish his goal


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## bluefrogtat2 (Mar 29, 2011)

hey john i have three right at the 2" mark too,can they be sexed like t's?
i have never tried to sex any of them yet.
definitely an interesting sp.
andy


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## John Apple (Mar 29, 2011)

easy to sex bro...males have a hairy patch and the females are almost bald like in macrothele


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## Evanator1996 (Jul 19, 2012)

if you catch any and you are coming down towards Richmond or Oakland I would like to buy some from you if their a reasonable price.


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