Gbb found upside-down in water dish

Shaunb89

Arachnopeon
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I'm new to tarantula keeping and all tom moran keeps saying put water dish in they won't drown. Well I used a pill container thingy really small and when I got home my gbb was upside-down in the water fighting to get out. I quickly flipped the dish over and the tarantula flipped itself back onto its back and is just twitching. Do you think it just happened to fall in water going into a molt or is it slowly dieing. Please help!!
P.s. it's a 3/4 in sling
 

goonius

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195
I'm new to tarantula keeping and all tom moran keeps saying put water dish in they won't drown. Well I used a pill container thingy really small and when I got home my gbb was upside-down in the water fighting to get out. I quickly flipped the dish over and the tarantula flipped itself back onto its back and is just twitching. Do you think it just happened to fall in water going into a molt or is it slowly dieing. Please help!!
P.s. it's a 3/4 in sling
On its back sounds like a molt. If its book lungs were not submerged (on its back they shouldn’t have been) then it could not have drowned, even if you left it alone. Interfering, unfortunately, may be bad news for a potentially molting spider. Time will tell. Now that it’s on its back again I would definitely leave it alone.

Can you post pictures so it would be easier to assess what is going on?
 

Dorifto

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It could be molting, please post a picture of the enclosure and the T (don't disturb the T to take the photo). It helps us more than a thousand words.
 

Shaunb89

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Yes I can post pics when I get home. And thanks I'm less worried now. It did refuse its meal Sunday. I went toget the dead worm out that's when I noticed it in the water.. do you think it went into the water on purpose??

And I haven't messed with it since dumping it out of the water.
 

goonius

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Yes I can post pics when I get home. And thanks I'm less worried now. It did refuse its meal Sunday. I went toget the dead worm out that's when I noticed it in the water.. do you think it went into the water on purpose??

And I haven't messed with it since dumping it out of the water.
Hard to know. Tarantulas often drink prior to a molt, so maybe that’s just where it happened to be when the urge to flip hit? No good answer. Only guesses. Tarantulas do odd things.
 

Shaunb89

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Ok so in the future if it happens to happen again just leave it upside-down in the water?? Just want 100% clarity on this. I've done weeks of research and never came across this.
And those pics will be coming around 6 o'clock texas time.
 

NMTs

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Ok so in the future if it happens to happen again just leave it upside-down in the water?? Just want 100% clarity on this. I've done weeks of research and never came across this.
And those pics will be coming around 6 o'clock texas time.
Most T's will web up a molting mat to lay on before they molt. GBB's in general like to web over their water dishes. It's certainly possible that it had webbed over the dish and was molting there, and you just didn't notice the webbing. The pics will help determine what happened, but when it comes to T's, your default should be to leave them alone and let them do whatever it is they're doing, no matter how strange it looks to you.
 

Matt Man

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most likely a molt. Lungs are facing up, dish isn't an issue
disregard this: I thought it was an adult
 
Last edited:

viper69

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Something is going on- likely a molt- no way for any of us to know

I however would NOT leave a T floating in the water.
 

Matt Man

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Molts can take hours. Ground looks damp (actually a good thing as it will provide some humidity)
It may take longer as yours may be stressed from it's ordeal. Keep an eye on it, breathe, don't stress and don't spend too much time with it. Check on it, from a distance every half hour
 

NMTs

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There's the pics. It's still twitching. How long does it usually take to fully molt?
Varies - could be minutes, could be hours. It looks pretty fat, so it could be molting. The other possibility is that it fell and landed awkwardly and injured itself, possibly in the water dish (which I don't see?). The set up is more appropriate for an arboreal species, which GBB's are not...
 

Shaunb89

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Yeah it's damp there because that's where the water dish was I just kept it out for now as to not bother it so much now this happened. And I attempted to make a high anchor point for it to web and I hear they have arboreal tendencies so I made it in the middle of the way my arboreal and terrestrial set up are.

It's been this way pushing 18 hours now...
 

NMTs

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It's been this way pushing 18 hours now...
The ventral side of it, especially between the book lungs, is very dark - it does look ready to molt, so that's likely what it's trying to do. The process was probably interrupted, so it may take some extra time. All you can really do is be patient and hope that it pulls through - nothing you can do to intervene at this point. Wishing you luck - keep us posted!
 

Shaunb89

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Alright, that's what I figured. I'm going to give it some space, I'll give an update tomorrow afternoon and let yall know.
 

darkness975

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Why, @viper69 ? I've always thought best to leave them alone, but I don't have your experience.
During molting they're vulnerable and they can't get away. If their book lungs get submerged in the water they could drown. When they're not molting it's fine as they can float if they fall in.
 
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