Are tarantulas alergic to cedar??

[Arborealis]

What I don't think everyone here realizes is that Le_Wasp has a Doctorate in Entomology. He's been studying insects and biological insect control for 9 years at a college level and for who knows how long before that. Don't argue bug science with him. You WILL lose whether or not you accept what you are reading.

 

[WyvernsLair]

I find this really really hard to believe. There are no special poison vapors being put off by a cedar chest. Maybe if the chest got soaking wet and then you let your T wander around all over it maybe I could see something happening maybe. But you just bringing in a cedar chest into the room and then having T's die like that is are not related in my opinion.

Cedar wood is KNOWN to contain volatile oils. Those oils to be the most effective have to come in direct contact with the animal, but those oils can also disperse into the air (hence the volatile nature) that can still cause health problems as the oils will adhere to and irritate the interior mucous linings of the throat, lungs and stomach causing lesions in most animals. Cedar is well known for generally being fatally toxic to invertebrates (which is why it is used in closets and such.. to kill moths and other bugs).

Rodents raised on cedar do poorly and colonies crash quickly as compared to colonies raised on aspen. I've raised many rodent colonies over the years on different substrates so I have first hand experience in how well they work or don't work...cedar is deadly.

Snakes fed rodents that were raised on cedar typically wind up not being able to keep food down because the oils from the cedar that are present on the fur of the prey have over a period of time created ulcers in the lining of the throat and stomach of the snake that cause it to regurge (that was the result of a necropsy I had a vet send off to a lab on a snake). The consistent problems of not keeping food down means that the stomach acid of the snake further irritates the ulcers originally caused by the cedar and puts further stress on the snake that is now starving.

The place I work at several years ago took in a rather large confiscated snake collection and, during the initial 10 day quarantine before we got them, animal control stupidly housed those animals on cedar and 1/3 of the collection ultimately died because of health problems linked directly to the cedar and cedar raised rodents donated to AC. We won't go into how anothe 1/3 of the snakes died because AC housed kingsnakes with each other and many got eaten by their cage mates. Of the initial survivors... many never did fully recover and had chronic health problems long afterwards. One milksnake couldn't really keep food down that was larger than a baby hopper mouse and could not be fed more than one baby mouse per 2 weeks...larger items or more frequent feedings caused too much irratation and led to more regurging. It certainly wasn't enough food to sustain an adult animal. He slowly wasted away and died two years later. A leucistic pine snake didn't make it past 6 months before he died (he's the one that had the necropsy done).

 

[WyvernsLair]

So here's a relevant question... Those mass produced 1/2 logs a lot of people use for hides; what are they made of? It looks like some kind of pine to me. Aren't all pines potentially harmful?

Pine is volatile like cedar, just not as much so. Pine can be made safe when it's been kiln dried to burn off nearly all of the oils in it. Rodents and other mammals can do pretty good on kiln dried pine, but I still wouldn't trust it with snakes or inverts. I seem to remember reading somewhere that the hide logs for reptiles I think are some other kind of wood and not pine.