Concerned mom of a rescued tarantula

[SevenLeggedSquish]

Hello! I’ve been searching and scouring the forums and wonderful information provided in the beginners sections, but I’m not sure if they quite answer my concerns. I apologize if this isn’t the right spot for this question or if the question is kind of dumb.

I used to be one of those people terrified of spiders that never would have considered a tarantula as a pet..then I got into watching feeding videos and desensitized myself to the fear. Long story short, an opportunity arose to rescue my first tarantula and it happened to be a species I had thought “ah yes, this would be the one if I got one”

I rescued a hobby from curly hair from a coworker of mine many months ago. He had purchased it thinking his girlfriend would be okay with it and she totally wasn’t. So, I took the spider. We had no idea on age or sex, I was waiting on a molt to find out. I had fed the tarantula twice since taking it in, and it has been refusing food since. Fat abdomen so I wasn’t concerned.

Now here is my concern, Squish (the spider), appears to have been webbing a molting mat as of yesterday and today. I noticed this morning, yellow bubbles under the web. It looked like spider puke, or bug guts... the abdomen was much smaller, there was no molt in the enclosure, and Squish is still webbing up.


I checked for information on sperm webs, but that didn’t seem to be what this was. If it is a male I don’t believe it to be fully mature based on looking at the pedipalps.Squish is now still webbing and moving around, but I still have no clue what the yellow bubbly bug guts are or if I should be worried. I would post a photo, and will try if I’m able... butSquish has now webbed it off from view and I don’t want to disturb the spider or the web it’s working so hard on until I know it’s safe to do so.


Like I said this may be kind of a dumb concern, I wish I had more information on my specific T but it having been a bit of a rescue... I just really don’t know much on its age/health/sex etc. thank you so much in advance to anyone who reads this or answers. I’ll be checking back but I’ll also now be scouring other parts of the forums to see if I find any answers I didn’t see before.

 

[Spaceman]

Can you send a picture of the T and the web mat ?

 

[AphonopelmaTX]

Yellow, bubbly substance produced from the abdomen on silk could only be one thing... It laid eggs.

 

[SevenLeggedSquish]

Can you send a picture of the T and the web mat ?

It now appears Squish has rolled most of the substance up in the web mat and is now sitting on top of it guarding it. Down in that little corner there is a bit of the substance that didn’t make it onto the web mat. Now, like another comment said, I’m wondering if that’s an egg sac. Which honestly I just would not have thought of before getting a molt and identifying the gender

 

[Spaceman]

Yup, that’s an egg sac alright

 

[Colorado Ts]

Those look like eggs to me...

 

[SevenLeggedSquish]

Yellow, bubbly substance produced from the abdomen on silk could only be one thing... It laid eggs.

Honestly now that you say that and I see her rolling the “bubbles” into the web mat to make a sac, that’s my best guess! I just wouldn’t have thought of that as I was still trying to identify gender. Thank you so much, I know it was a bit silly of me to ask I was just worried about my T being sick or something!

 

[SevenLeggedSquish]

Yup, that’s an egg sac alright

I guess now I know Squish’s gender!

 

[coolnweird]

Hopefully it's not a viable sac, or you could have a couple hundred babies running around in about a month! You might look to see if any local exotic pet stores would be interested in taking the spiderlings off your hands. That said, tarantulas do lay 'dummy' or phantom sacs sometimes, so there's no telling if the eggs are fertile or not. I'll give you the advice a professional breeder gave me when I had an unexpected eggsac; if you don't want to take care of the babies, pull the sac out and discard it, they won't survive without care. I know it seems a bit brutal, but it might be better than hundreds of unexpected babies.

 

[Thekla]

First of all, ask your coworker if the T moulted in his care and if he bred her after that. Judging by your story, I'd assume the answer will be no to both questions. Then you should ask him where he had bought the T. My guess is, that it could be wild-caught. In that case, the sac could be viable.

Assuming it is viable, you have about a month before you should pull the sac from the mother and decide what to do with it. Try to find someone who will take the whole sac from you. In the meantime, there're tons of tutorials on how to incubate the eggs (after pulling the sac) until they hatch and beyond. That gives you at least another month or two (I'm no expert in these specific timelines, so, don't take my word on it, but here are so many wonderful people who will help you and your slings). There are options besides throwing the sac in the bin!!! Even in these times. So, please, think about it.

 

[SevenLeggedSquish]

thank you coolnweird and Thekla!


Admittedly I’m new enough to the tarantula hobby that I hadn’t even considered breeding or an egg sac to be possible. That thought was a little foolish of me. I’ve kept scorpions and snakes my whole life, But tarantulas are new for me. I tried to do my best research/enclosure set up, starting feeder insect colonies etc.. but I definitely wasn’t prepared for a potentially viable egg sac. Having done my research I know that those big chain pet stores aren’t where you should buy a T, or any critter really, as they may be wild caught or they just don’t have much information on the animal or care itself. My coworker bought the T from one of those stores, telling me about the bad enclosure it was in, how it was missing a leg, and it kept getting stuck in the metal screen lid. Then, his girlfriend got mad, and he figured since I kept scorpions, a spider would be fine. He only had the T two weeks before I pickedher up, so no molt, he’d been waiting on that to identify gender as well. Now that I know this is an egg sac I know she’s a female before I get a molt. I’ll have to do a little research to see if I can find any professional breeders in my area, I hadn’t found any prior when I was looking to actually buy my own T’s... but I do live kind of out in the boonies. I do have the means and the want to care for the slings if it is a viable sac, but I definitely don’t have the experience. I’ll be keeping an eye on the situation, do some more research, and go from there I guess!

thank you all so much for the quick advice and help. I could have spent hours watching videos or googling “spider puke” and still worrying that maybe spiders could get some weird spider version of the flu I didn’t know about. I feel really silly having not thought of an egg sac, I guess I just didn’t expect them to be so yellow and foamy, I really thought they were bubbles. So now if this thing is viable and I get a bunch of slings... one of them is going to be named Bubbles haha