- Joined
- Jul 17, 2002
- Messages
- 3,952
Successful? - yes
Any special care or preliminary notes for the lovers -
I received the male from Brandon in February 2003. I gave him a couple days to aclimate, but I must note that he started drumming immediately upon detecting the female's enclosure next to his.
How they were paired - after a couple days of this, I decided to let him try. I opened her container, and he stepped off my hand onto her hammock, drumming the entire time. She became alert, and walked over to him. He was maybe 1/3 her size, so I was slightly concerned about him being able to lift her. Turned out it was no problem.
I paired them a total of 4 times. The 3rd time, she came out of her container, and like trapeze artists, they hung between 2 containers! The 3rd time took the longest as well. The fourth introduction, the male got startled, and ran into her container, where she promptly bit him straight through the carapace.
There was no salvaging him.
Any special post mating care - no post mating care for the female. I fed her as much as she would eat.
Time to sac - March 15 2003 she made an impressive size eggsac
Care of the sac - I pulled the sac at approx 30 days, and there were post embryos inside. There were a few clumps of eggs stuck together, I was sucessful at carefully separating some of them, and some of them just popped open. I removed them.
Time to emerge/hatch - May 10 2003 spiderlings molted into 2nd instar and I started separating them.
The final details - I ended up with 147 healthy 2nd instars. I lost approx 20 or so from the clumped up ones, to the ones that molted into first instar terribly deformed.
Any special care or preliminary notes for the lovers -
I received the male from Brandon in February 2003. I gave him a couple days to aclimate, but I must note that he started drumming immediately upon detecting the female's enclosure next to his.
How they were paired - after a couple days of this, I decided to let him try. I opened her container, and he stepped off my hand onto her hammock, drumming the entire time. She became alert, and walked over to him. He was maybe 1/3 her size, so I was slightly concerned about him being able to lift her. Turned out it was no problem.
I paired them a total of 4 times. The 3rd time, she came out of her container, and like trapeze artists, they hung between 2 containers! The 3rd time took the longest as well. The fourth introduction, the male got startled, and ran into her container, where she promptly bit him straight through the carapace.
There was no salvaging him.
Any special post mating care - no post mating care for the female. I fed her as much as she would eat.
Time to sac - March 15 2003 she made an impressive size eggsac
Care of the sac - I pulled the sac at approx 30 days, and there were post embryos inside. There were a few clumps of eggs stuck together, I was sucessful at carefully separating some of them, and some of them just popped open. I removed them.
Time to emerge/hatch - May 10 2003 spiderlings molted into 2nd instar and I started separating them.
The final details - I ended up with 147 healthy 2nd instars. I lost approx 20 or so from the clumped up ones, to the ones that molted into first instar terribly deformed.