I swear I'm not sorry I rescued this Pholcid, but aw jeeeez! Update....

[Monnie]

Thanks to those who had info advice back in January about my P. phalangioides that I have who laid eggs.

I was away from home Jan 20-22 and arrived home on the 23rd to see 33 or 34 little pepper flake looking hatchlings. So they hatched between day 25 and day 27. About a week or so later, they have molted (and they are so cute!). My plan was to separate them, but they are fast, and Phyllis (the mom) was running around like crazy laying down more web AND catching fruit flies which she was giving to at least some of the slings. Eventually she calmed down and mostly ignores them. As of today I've caught and removed about 16. I don't think all of them made it this far. I put a ton of D. melanogasters in there, but did observe a fight between 3 of them over a recently killed fruit fly, and can't rule out potential cannibalizing, though I've kept it well stocked with prey. Also those wingless D. melanogasters have descendants both flightless, and winged, so that works well since the flying ones are easy to stir up so the spiders can get after them.

Now for the awww jeez moment I had yesterday. I went to my Mom's for dinner, took a look before leaving to see if anyone looked catchable, grabbed a few that were easy to reach, and said bye. On my return, Phyllis is holding ANOTHER egg sac. I was already wondering where I can unload the original ones. Still, from another view, it's actually kind of a cool nature thing that she can lay more eggs though she hasn't been dating again. I really don't want to take them away, but she's holding them, so I don't see how I could even if I wanted to. Maybe I'll get to watch this group hatch, anyway. Had she been whacked with the broom as my neighbor intended, all these babies would have never existed. The ones I removed are doing fine, and could probably be released any time as they are quite well fed. I assume they won't all survive, so an obvious spider infestation should not occur (I hope).

Questions if anyone is familiar with cellar spiders:
~ How often should I feed slings? They seem to be eating more than one fruit fly a day in the big enclosure, so I'm putting a couple in with each of the ones I removed.
~ How soon might they molt again? I've searched the internet, called the local museum bug zoo curators, etc, but can't find any time frame for this.
~ Once they are moving can I assume they are good to go free? They seem well capable of hunting, but also seem to hang about close to their mom.

Again, any advice is appreciated. I'm learning a lot, and fast, but mostly the hard way....

 

[Charliemum]

I rescued a cellar spider from my cat last year that had an egg sack. I kept her safe till the baby's hatched watched them all do their first mass moult about a week after hatching and once they were catching food for themselves I took the viv put it in a dark quiet cupboard that we don't use much opend the viv and let them leave. The female stayed though we kept her she is called Ghia (and is still with us) she has never made another sack but I did read they can make 3 from 1 pairing so you could have another yet although the sacks get smaller the more she makes so you probably won't get 30 again . I was told the males will keep a harem aswell keeping upto 10 females there or more which has nothing to do with your girl but I found interesting that they will live communally
I found all my info from putting cellar spider into Google most wasn't good info but there was an article called mummy long legs that had some useful info and also @The Snark helped me alot as he had a colony of them living on his bathroom ceiling if your lucky he may help you too he is a busy man so sometimes can't but definitely worth an ask Good luck with your little ones I hope I helped more than hindered

 

[The Snark]

From observations.
Pholcids are basically maintenance free animals. Free roaming they will maintain a population within a home without any care. If there is little of no prey, their population shrinks. Abundant prey and it grows. All they need is a place to park. When food is scarce they go into a torpor and may not move for days or weeks. If food is abundant they will expand their webs.

They are fully communal. They may predate juveniles but I've never seen this happen. Quite likely the battles between any two of them would result in a stand off as they rely on webbing up their prey and they, one and all from newly hatched slings to mature adults, are more than capable at handling their own and other pholcid webs.
With abundant prey they expand their webs to include adjacent pholcids. They will cross boundaries and use their neighbors webs to catch prey. It's not unusual to see two or more feeding on the same victim.
It is quite common with an established colony of pholcids to see one great mass of web with every age from newly hatched slings to large adult harems. The smaller ones tend to make their own smaller webs attached or adjacent to adults.

If you want a large colony of them simply keep a piece of fruit near the ceiling. All ages can thrive on fruit flies.

A word of caution. They appear to be extremely sensitive to pesticides. When the farmers around us spray their fields our pholcid population plummets. The prey apparently become poison vectors and dying they more easily get caught by the spiders. The farmer across the road from us has planted out a wide variety of crops and uses pesticides constantly. Our pholcid population is nearly nil right now.

 

[Monnie]

Thanks, Charliemum and The Snark! I appreciate the info. I will try to find the "Mummy Long Legs" article. Also I'm very glad to hear that multiple ages can coexist. I was worrying if the older slings would go after the new ones, but I've got a bunch of fruit fly cultures going, so there's plenty to eat for the spiders, and thus I won't panic if I can't get all the older ones caught.

I greatly appreciate the warning about pesticides. I don't use them around my apartment, though I do sometimes spray my clothes with permethrin for backpacking trips, which I will do over at my Mom's if I need it. I had to use drain unclogger stuff recently, but I kept the door to the room shut and ran an exhaust fan, just in case the chemicals would be bad for them. It smelled kind of bleachy and I figured better safe than sorry. Now I'm glad I was so paranoid/vigilant. I'd feel awful if I did something to harm them!

Thanks again for the help & advice!