Dead P.irminia sling

[Doug H]

I checked on my slings before going to work this morning and noticed my P.irminia sling was dead the wierd th8ing is that it had (poop)white stuff on its butt.very strange ,anybody else have this happen before. All my other slings are fine

 

[Nixy]

I don't know about the poo situation. Perhaps it was ejected during death struggles?

I'm sorry to hear abut your loss.

 

[conipto]

I've never had it happen to me, but in a past thread, It is reffered to as unscientifically as "The butt plug of doom". Code Monkey told me this, when I asked what caused it:


Bill, there has been a lot of traffic about this on the ATS list in the past few months. There are two working interrelated theories. Often the butt plug goes hand in hand with similar crud at the mouth if the infection goes on long enough. Microscopic examination of the crud usually reveals nematodes.

Enter the chicken and egg hypotheses. In theory, nematodes should not be able to enter a tarantula except possibly via a wound or the book lungs because even eggs should be filtered by their mouth parts (another potential route of entry is the anus itself, though). Someone was doing autopsies and cultures of internal goo to see if the nematodes were actually infecting the Ts but I'm a bit behind on reading all my mailing lists so I haven't seen if the results were ever released.
The second theory is that the infections are bacterial and the nematodes are opportunistically breeding out of control at the slimier orifices of the T but not necessarily making their way inside.

A third theory combines the two and suggests that the actual infection might be bacterial but that its being carried by externally parasitic nematodes which are infecting scuttle flies (which would provide a vector for transmission. This theory is interesting, but there are always bacteria and nematodes present, so unless culturing reveals specific and unusaul types associated with the infections, we're still back at an opportunistic infection for the explanation.
Somewhere between the all the ideas is the cause. If nothing else, it's another good reason why you shouldn't keep Ts too moist as that just promotes nematode and bacterial growth.


You aren't the first, and unfortunately wont be the last to lose one in this manner.. Sorry to hear about your irminia though, they are such awesome T's.

Bill