H. maculata help

The Log

Arachnopeon
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Dec 16, 2019
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Hello everybody this is my first ever post on this site. A few weeks ago I picked up an H. maculata (my first of this species) at an expo near me, once I got it home I noticed it had only seven legs which was not that big of a deal to me. Later I noticed that there appeared to be metal shavings and mold in the cup it was packed in so I rehoused it as soon as possible providing cocofiber substrate, some moss, good ventilation, cork bark for climbing and to hide behind, small water dish and some fake plants. I keep him in a room between 70 and 80 degrees F. It behaved fine and acted normal and was very easy to feed the last few weeks and did its fair share of exploring the enclosure. I checked on it just yesterday and it was visually normal appearing and behaving normally. However today when I checked on my tarantula I noticed one of its pedipalps was stuck in its webbing and the abdomen had become very suddenly deflated and the tarantula is now in death curl. Now that this has happened it just seems peculiar to me he was missing a leg and then the metal shavings and now the broken off pedipalp. Does anybody here think I perhaps bought a tarantula on borrowed time without realizing? How can I help prevent this from happening to any of my future tarantulas? I am hoping that a miracle will happen because I have become quite fond of him over this short time but I figured I wanted to get some kind of advice for the future and make this a learning experience. Thanks for all help in advance.
 

The Log

Arachnopeon
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Dec 16, 2019
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I found the pedipalp at the very top of the bark I suppose he may have fallen off but I don't think that would account for the other issues. Thanks for taking a look.
 

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Table

Arachnosquire
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Jun 3, 2020
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Is the T still alive? is it responsive when you touch it?
 

Smotzer

ArachnoGod
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Has it had water in the water dish? The sudden abdomen deflation is strange, possibly it ruptured underneath?
 

The Log

Arachnopeon
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Dec 16, 2019
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Yes I've made sure the dish has had water consistently and I also spray lightly once a week. It all just seems so strange to me
 

emartinm28

Arachnoknight
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Mar 29, 2020
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Would you happen to have a picture of the cup it came in? Possible that a minor injury opened up even more? I would have added more substrate and leaned the corkbark over more but that probably isn’t the cause of your issues here. The substrate looks moist and the water dish has water, so I can’t see how it would suddenly dehydrate like that apart from some sort of injury.
 

The Log

Arachnopeon
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Dec 16, 2019
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I have this partial one. I'm not sure you can see very well in the photo but there are these little reflective chunks of what looked like aluminum to me. I also provided the water dish in there for the spider while I was setting up the new enclosure. The container was just a deli cup.
 

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DomGom TheFather

Arachnoprince
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Apr 26, 2020
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The reflective bits are vermiculite.
Could be a ruptured abdomen.
Sorry about your spider.
 

viper69

ArachnoGod
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Dec 8, 2006
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I always check legs and such before I buy the animal, I also make sure the T is responsive to disturbances before buying it.

Those are the only ways I know of to mitigate such crap
 

8 legged

Arachnoprince
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Nov 25, 2020
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For me it's - to be honest - from start to finish, a very, very bizarre story! Sorry.
 
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