brocklehursti/geniculata confusion

ornamentalist

Arachnoknight
Joined
Oct 2, 2010
Messages
196
hi everyone.
so iv had, what was sold to me as adult female A. geniculata for about 2 months now, (she is positively humongous so she is definately female). today i bought a mm for her, now i have seen various posts from confused people trying to mate a brocklehursti with geniculata because, only to the trained eye is there a specific difference. now i am also one of these confused/untrained eyed person, and i would have bought the mm anyway because of te great price, however i do wish to breed them but dont want to try if they are not the same, as i hear this leads to a disasterous conclusion for the mm all too often. i will post a pic of each here, i know they probably should go in the i.d section, but i feel there is other issues to address other than the i.d of them and the 2 pics next to each other will be easier to compare than 1 in each thread. i have also posted a pic of the female in i.d with no reply :( male is the top picture.
a big thankyou to anyone out there who can shed some light on the subject!
:D
 

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jt39565

Arachnoknight
Joined
Aug 28, 2010
Messages
179
I am by no means an expert on the subject. With that I am pleased to give my $.02. I am the proud owner of an A. brock which I purchased from a reputable national dealer so I am certain that what I have is in fact not an A. geniculata.
Thru my research I have found the only "real" difference is A. brock seems to have more spindly legs. Looking at mine ( She is next to my computer) and yours mine has a bit more salmon coloration. I know this is not by any means a scientific conclusion but makes me think you may have a pair of A. geniculata. I hope this does not further complicate things for you.
Also in my opinion I believe somewhere in the not so distant past there where cros breedings going on(?) and caused a muting of the 2 sp ?
 

Imbrium

Arachnopeon
Joined
Mar 31, 2009
Messages
48
The A. geniculata have thicker bands on their legs. Your pics both look like genics to me, but I don't have much experience other than comparing pics.
 

ornamentalist

Arachnoknight
Joined
Oct 2, 2010
Messages
196
thanks everyone. Heres hoping. Im going to intro him in about a weeks time after he makes his first sperm web. Hes a fresh moult (6 days ago) so heavy feeding all round when hes hardened fully and then intro in approx 7 days. Will keep you posted. Iv heard the genics have totally different embolus and courting behavior, and thats why the male ends up a meal if hes a wrong un, hes done the wrong dance, or has the wrong key to the lock, so to speak.

---------- Post added at 03:50 AM ---------- Previous post was at 03:46 AM ----------

and you were talking about the salmon colouration, the female has more pinkish bands, the pic doesnt show it too clearly, the local pet shop i got her from said the reason behind that is, he feeds the crickets just carrots, and thats what turned them that colour. I cant see it myself, but you never know :?
 

Chris_Skeleton

Arachnoprince
Old Timer
Joined
Jan 31, 2010
Messages
1,309
ornamentalist said:
and you were talking about the salmon colouration, the female has more pinkish bands, the pic doesnt show it too clearly, the local pet shop i got her from said the reason behind that is, he feeds the crickets just carrots, and thats what turned them that colour. I cant see it myself, but you never know :?
That pet shop is full of crap
 

ornamentalist

Arachnoknight
Joined
Oct 2, 2010
Messages
196
well, they are going bankrupt for a reason mate. If theyre not talking crap, theyre selling it. I think jesus walked on earth last time they cleaned the place, it smells really bad and the vivs are all grubby with dirty water dishes all round. Then i was talking to him about my p. Metallica and he said quote: 'i can make you a viv, a big one, and you can keep all your arboreals communaly together. Just chuck them in there and watch em breed etc, thats how they get all those mad colours in the first place'. Numpty, yeah alrite then lets give it a go and see if my irminia wants a piece of my mm striata. Then we can sell the slings as irmata and destroy the hobby as we all know it. I know it would never happen, they would destroy each other long before that. He does worry me with talk like that though, if hes done it with hundreds of different pokies, who knows what he could be putting out there....regallica slings anyone?
 

sjl197

Arachnoknight
Old Timer
Joined
Feb 3, 2008
Messages
240
wow the comments i hear about petshop idiots sometimes amazes me.


Right, ok your spiders.
Yes, the male A.geniculata looks fine to me, for A.geniculata. And my eye is quite well trained to these now.

There is a good alternate picture of the MM pettrade broklehursti at the link below on the trarantulacanada website that you can compare to yours. These have much thinner white bands at the distal ends of each segment on the legs both MM and females. The knee markings can much less too, but that seems to vary and not reliable. Both species are about the same size as both males and females, so 'spindly' isnt useful to distinguish.
http://www.tarantulacanada.ca/gallery/images/359.php
(hope i can get away with linking martinG/tarcans photo)

The best way to tell though is to look at the bulbs. Its possible to hold males of these species in the hand (minding the urticating hairs) and use forceps to lift out one of the bulbs, while still on live spider.
The differences between the bulbs of the 2 species is shown here.
http://www.the-t-store.co.uk/forum/index.php?showtopic=8382

Or, you can pull off the entire palp which will snap at the base...
And yes, it is possible that some stock in captivity is hybridized. But both your male and female look good to be A.geniculata.
Have fun...! Goodluck breeding
stuart
 
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