Latrodectus hybrids?

[jsloan]

I currently have a male tredecimguttatus in with a female mactans, I haven't seen any pairings; the male seems to stay away from the female. The female is getting rather fat, so who knows..

Just want to clarify: this is the same female whose eggs are now hatching, and she's never been with another male, L. mactans or otherwise, right?
If so, it'll be interesting to see how well the spiderlings do.

 

[jsloan]

Pic:
Sorry about the quality, I had to upload it to Tinypic

Good picture. Did you tear open the sac or something?

 

[Richard McJimsey]

Just want to clarify: this is the same female whose eggs are now hatching, and she's never been with another male, L. mactans or otherwise, right?
If so, it'll be interesting to see how well the spiderlings do.

Correct.
I did tear open the sac, I have had good luck with incubating true spiders in an incubator, rather than leaving them in the eggsac. Just a personal preference I guess.

 

[Tarantula155]

Correct.
I did tear open the sac, I have had good luck with incubating true spiders in an incubator, rather than leaving them in the eggsac. Just a personal preference I guess.

I hate reviving a ancient thread but how did they turn out? I'm thinking about purchasing various species in the Latrodectus family to attempt to hybridize.

 

[Richard McJimsey]

I hate reviving a ancient thread but how did they turn out? I'm thinking about purchasing various species in the Latrodectus family to attempt to hybridize.

They all died at the EWL stage.

 

[Epiphyte]

My garden in the Los Angeles area has many Latrodectus geometricus in it. Some seem quite dark and I'm wondering if there's any chance of hybridization with Latrodectus hesperus.

 

[The Snark]

My garden in the Los Angeles area has many Latrodectus geometricus in it. Some seem quite dark and I'm wondering if there's any chance of hybridization with Latrodectus hesperus.

Next to none. It would have happened by now is the consensus of experts. Geos are invasive and displacing Hesperus.

 

[Epiphyte]

Next to none. It would have happened by now is the consensus of experts. Geos are invasive and displacing Hesperus.

But have the experts conducted any experiments or tests? Or are they basing it on morphology? What would a hybrid look like?

 

[Albireo Wulfbooper]

But have the experts conducted any experiments or tests? Or are they basing it on morphology? What would a hybrid look like?

It has been demonstrated experimentally that these two species do not respond to each other's pheromones, so no mating would occur. In fact L. geometricus responds *only* to the pheromones from its own species (while some other species will respond to closely related species), probably because it is further diverged from other Latrodectus.

 

[The Snark]

There is an odd similarity between Geometricus and the Himalayan blackberry. Introduced from Europe to the Pacific Northwest that blackberry is extraordinarily invasive, not only finding a niche in the eco system it utilizes the native blackberry to propagate with the resulting plants being entirely the Himalayan species with no traits of the native varieties. Odd in how one species, the native variety, rejects others and is difficult to propagate while another easily assimilates and genetically completely dominates.
If the same thing occurred with Hesperus and Geometricus we would be putting Hesperus on the endangered list.

 

[SilentWidowMaker]

there has been documentation in new zealand of katipos (L. katipo) and redbacks (L. hasselti) mating with each other to produce offspring.

can the same be done with NA species? a friend of mine has tried this once with hesperus and mactans. a female hesp was paired with a male mac. the result was a dud sac, no offspring. but in the case of the new zealand species, is it a male-specific thing? anyone have any experience with this?



as an experiment, tonight i paired a female mac with a male hesp. witnessed several insertions and mating lasted for a couple of hours, with a very long courtship period.

hesperus and mactans were used b/c it's been figured that they might be the 2 closest relatives and they are the ones whose ranges would be most likely to overlap.

anyway, let me know what y'all think. would be interested to hear some experiences if anyone has them.

I'm very interested in these results I've wondered the same thing but not sure if the male bulbous is a specific fit to same species or not.

 

[darkness975]

I hate reviving a ancient thread but how did they turn out? I'm thinking about purchasing various species in the Latrodectus family to attempt to hybridize.

Please don't. Latrodectus are in enough trouble as it is without this.

 

[Tarantula155]

Please don't. Latrodectus are in enough trouble as it is without this.

I already have, sort of. I've used a mexican locale hesperus?? the 'mexicanus' species and crossed it with my native hesperus. High mortality rate, only a handful survived, weird coloration and only a few kept the red coloration on the outer back. About 2-3 lasted close to 2 years (kept very warm and well fed likely cause of shortened lifespan besides the obvious cross)

 

[Arthroverts]

I already have, sort of. I've used a mexican locale hesperus?? the 'mexicanus' species and crossed it with my native hesperus. High mortality rate, only a handful survived, weird coloration and only a few kept the red coloration on the outer back. About 2-3 lasted close to 2 years (kept very warm and well fed likely cause of shortened lifespan besides the obvious cross)

Were they fertile?

Thanks,

Arthroverts

 

[The Snark]

Just to mention, the native range of L Hesperus are the four major deserts of North America. The Great Basin desert reaching the length of eastern Oregon almost to the border of Washington state along with parts of Idaho, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, Arizona, California and nearly all of Nevada, the Mojave desert reaching from Tehachapi, Death Valley, Searchlight on the Nevada border and the northern extent of the Salton Sea region, the Sonora desert connecting to the Mojave and covering most of the state of Sonora and nearly all of Baja California, and the Chihuahuan desert including parts of New Mexico, Texas, the state of Chihuahua and within 100 miles of the Gulf of Mexico.

 

[Tarantula155]

Were they fertile?

Thanks,

Arthroverts

Actually I don't think so. We did try to pair them but no luck.