Oxygen Consumption Rate of Tarantulas

[Snowwaffle]

This is mainly brought up from my newbie confusion of shipping Ts and how long they can last before their air runs out, but then again, I don't know what goes into boxing them up.
Anyways, Questions!
What's the rate of consumption for a sling compared to an adult?
Have there been any recorded deaths of Ts dying from presumed lack of oxygen?
Is it likely they would die from dehydration first?
If anything, I likely just need a more in-depth crash course on their weird little booklungs lmao

 

[jbooth]

It's more likely they'll cook or freeze. Pay for whatever shipping gets the LAG unless it's perfect weather and like one spiderling... Buy the hot/cold pack if it is an addon if weather requires it. Slings basically consume none, adults barely any. Usually there are at least pinprick holes, and they are packed in moist paper towels or sphagnum moss in individual vials. Usually the box is insulated but you sure don't want it left in the sun/cold. I have yet to see anything packed wrong I have ever gotten, I'm sure people will chime in with horror stories though. Someone posted one yesterday about it "might get hungry" and so they put a roach in...

 

[viper69]

This is mainly brought up from my newbie confusion of shipping Ts and how long they can last before their air runs out, but then again, I don't know what goes into boxing them up.
Anyways, Questions!
What's the rate of consumption for a sling compared to an adult?
Have there been any recorded deaths of Ts dying from presumed lack of oxygen?
Is it likely they would die from dehydration first?
If anything, I likely just need a more in-depth crash course on their weird little booklungs lmao

1. Not an active soul on this forum has measured that.. Consumption is low for both. Did you search google? If not, why not? There answer is out there. If you found AB, you can find the answer to this question, as I did many years ago.
2 No- deaths are due to temperature, too high/cold
3 Yes this happens

Lungs- google is your friend, search. Then once you learn something detailed and interesting on how they work, come back and contribute to the community.

 

[Poonjab]

.0000386ppm

 

[CutThroat Kid]

Not an active soul on this forum has measured that

In college, I tested the CO2 production rate of crickets under various frequencies of acoustic stress. I wonder if the rate of CO2 production could be tested in tarantulas in the same way. 25 crickets in a 16 Oz bottle produce a good amount of CO2 for me in a short test period. But crickets don't have passive respiration like tarantulas, so I wonder if Ts would even produce enough CO2 for those sensors to pick up in a reasonable test period.

 

[viper69]

In college, I tested the CO2 production rate of crickets under various frequencies of acoustic stress. I wonder if the rate of CO2 production could be tested in tarantulas in the same way. 25 crickets in a 16 Oz bottle produce a good amount of CO2 for me in a short test period. But crickets don't have passive respiration like tarantulas, so I wonder if Ts would even produce enough CO2 for those sensors to pick up in a reasonable test period.

Their O2 requirements have been measured.

 

[DaveM]

I think @viper69 gave the right answer: Google.
Using Google, I found this paper: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00694442

Summarizing key points:
* larger spiders tend to consume more oxygen
* oxygen consumption goes way up (~7.7x as high) in active versus resting spiders

The values they report for the Brachypelma smithi (though today they would call it B. hamorii), are:
22ul oxygen per gram of spider per hour -- in a resting spider
170ul oxygen per gram of spider per hour -- in an active spider

A cube-shaped box about 5" per side contains >2 million ul of air, at atmospheric 21% oxygen, that's about 430,000 ul oxygen.
AND the boxes we ship tarantulas in are certainly not gas-impermeable. New oxygen gets into the boxes all the time.

 

[cold blood]

The inefficient book lung doesnt go through air like a mammal....air passes over the lungs, its a passive system...its not breathed in, consumed and then exhaled like it would be for most other animals.

I have had a box of ts lost in the mail for 17 days, during a heat wave (when their metabolic rate would be peaked) and had zero losses.....they would die of many other things in shipping way before consuming all the air would do them in......this, combined with a tarantulas desire for dark, cramped places are precisely what makes them such an easily shippable animal.

 

[Introvertebrate]

Fun fact. Jurassic invertebrates were so big because of a higher O2 content in the atmosphere. Right now, it's 21%. 300 million years ago, it was 31-35%.

"That means that the respiratory systems of the insects (and arachnids) could be smaller and still deliver enough oxygen to meet their demands, allowing the creatures to grow much larger."

 

[CrazyOrnithoctonineGuy]

Fun fact. Jurassic invertebrates were so big because of a higher O2 content in the atmosphere. Right now, it's 21%. 300 million years ago, it was 31-35%.

"That means that the respiratory systems of the insects (and arachnids) could be smaller and still deliver enough oxygen to meet their demands, allowing the creatures to grow much larger."

That wasn't during the Jurassic. That was during the Carboniferous, long before the Jurassic.

By the time things like dinosaurs came along, oxygen levels and arthropod sizes had fallen, and the sizes of dinosaurs during the Jurassic and Cretaceous had nothing to do with high oxygen levels; in fact, oxygen levels during the Mesozoic ranged from slightly lower than today (19%) during the Jurassic to significantly lower than today (<15%) during the Triassic and parts of the Cretaceous.

Amber provides new insights into the evolution of Earth's atmosphere: Low oxygen levels for dinosaurs

Scientists have reconstructed the composition of the Earth's atmosphere of the last 220 million years by analyzing modern and fossil plant resins. The results suggest that atmospheric oxygen was considerably lower in the Earth's geological past than previously assumed. This new study questions...

www.sciencedaily.com

 

[klawfran3]

I think @viper69 gave the right answer: Google.
Using Google, I found this paper: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00694442


The values they report for the Brachypelma smithi (though today they would call it B. hamorii), are:
22ul oxygen per gram of spider per hour -- in a resting spider
170ul oxygen per gram of spider per hour -- in a resting spider

For that second statistic did you mean active instead of resting?
And I'm so happy you posted the actual study lol, love to see all that data. Makes me feel like I'm back in college and crying at all the statistics calculations again

 

[DaveM]

For that second statistic did you mean active instead of resting?
And I'm so happy you posted the actual study lol, love to see all that data. Makes me feel like I'm back in college and crying at all the statistics calculations again

Yes, thank you. I've corrected my typo.

 

[Introvertebrate]

That wasn't during the Jurassic. That was during the Carboniferous, long before the Jurassic.

Yeah, I picked an arbitrary moment in time, hoping you would come through for me. Thanks for not disappointing.

 

[CutThroat Kid]

I found this paper

I'd skim a lot more papers if my institution actually gave me access to Springer. And if I had the time.. Thanks for the summation!