P. Audax slings n stuff

[ThatSquareChick]

So I had these two wc P. Audax, a breeding pair that I got the female from the local neighborhood and my husband got the male from 5 miles away so they had a good chance of not being related directly. I thought it would be nice to breed them and put some more bold spooders out there to be loved.
I don’t think I really, like, conceptualized how many slings I’d end up with and how soon. The day after I mated them I discovered that my common zebra had laid a hidden sac in a twig and she emerged and passed away immediately but her babies kept coming out for the next 13 days.
So I have now 13 salticus scenicas slings eating prekilled heidei flies or cricket legs. They’re doing okay but I guess only having 13 babies stuck in my head and then I saw this yesterday!
My P. Audax that had went into her nest from mating a few inches away and laid her eggs that same durn night!
I’ve heard that audaxes take their time leaving the web but I’m guessing they are 2Li, they only got this dark color yesterday so maybe a couple of days before they start to migrate out?

the questions boil down to these:
1. How quickly do I have to go all pokey crazy on deli cups? Is this a “take a day off work tomorrow because it takes for-eeever!” kind of situation or do I have a few days?

2. I can’t leave the web as-is. It’s a bio-active enclosure and there are things in there that might hurt lil slings. If I remove the web and put it somewhere else intact, will she go to it when I move her? I don’t want to separate her from the nest and I don’t have anything bigger I can use to put the whole thing in. I can easily cut her web’s section of plastic with a utility knife and there are a thousand containers that can be used to house her and the web until they disperse. Will she still want to be with it if I move her now?

3. how do you mentally deal with having to feed and watch over like 120 babies? I just realized that I’m going to need a lot of pinheads, fruit flies and cotton makeup rounds.

4. I have barely enough light to encourage the zebra babies to eat, sometimes I have to use a bright led flashlight to get them to eat. How much more light am I gonna need with all these slings?

5. how do I ship juveniles once they’re big enough? I’ve seen them come in paper toweling, how do you get them in there without crushing them or stressing them out?

 

[Nicole C G]

It sounds like you’re not equipped to handle too many. I don’t think it’s logical to care for 120 of them. It would probably take hours just feeding them every day. Also, if her enclosure isn’t suitable for eggs, why did you breed her? We’re you just planning to move her but it happened too fast? Sorry if I sound harsh, I hope the best.

 

[ThatSquareChick]

No, you’re not being harsh, but it did happen too fast, I had no idea my zebra was already sitting or I would have never attempted to breed my others. I also had no idea of the super low nest in my sitticus tank.

I had read that it takes anywhere from a week to a month for a bred spider to produce eggs, my audax literally laid them the same night as she was bred with no time to move her. Once she was sitting I knew I had time to come up with an answer. I really think I’m just going to move mom and babies into a cheezeball container so I can easily move her without disturbing the nest and then her babies will have plenty of room to spend the first while when the most casualties are likely to happen. I’ve got plenty to feed them and my comment about the zebra babies and light was more of a complaint that there were only 13 to start with and they won’t all survive anyway and it’s so stupidly important to me that I rear as many of her young as I can because she gave them to me to take care of before she died. As my oldest spood, it’s kind of a point of pride I guess. So I baby them. I won’t have to do that with the others, there will just be too many and I will want the strongest of the bunch anyway, not to say just screwem rather that I don’t want to adopt a spood to someone whom I had to force feed cricket legs to just to get it fat enough to molt.

 

[CRX]

Curious for updates on this

 

[ThatSquareChick]

THEY LIVE!!!

zebra spider live count: 10 survivors and they now eat live melanogastors without me needing to pre kill them. I bought them 2 under cabinet lights and they love it. I also bought a rack from Home Depot and now they are housed much better.

The Audax slings are almost a month old now, they are on to hydei flightless flies and are RAVENOUS. I feed them every other day and it takes about 2 1/2 hours.

Mama Phyllis laid another sac a week after she left the first nest. Now there are over 200 Audax slings in my house. The newest ones who came out three days ago all live communally in a 2ft by 1ft clear plastic cheezeball container with pinholes in it and a lady stocking for a top.

I have only had three losses that I know of, including one where it got ready to jump at a fly and hit his sibling by mistake and when he realized his mistake he doubled down and just ate him.

It took a few days but I managed to get room and light for them all and now I have fly cultures that I’ve been keeping going by myself and trying to breed crickets for pinheads too but if you look at crickets cross-eyes they all die. The best way to keep crickets alive is to feed them a commercial water food mix gel or wafoo, no drinking water, no fruit or veg besides the occasional teeny slice of potato, put a 8w heating mat underneath and forget about them until you need to feed them or feed them TO stuff. They are just generally weak af. They will actually gorge on water or water based food until they over saturated and die.

But the update is very happy! All living happily and getting ready to be adopted by spooder lovers in my groups

 

[Nicole C G]

THEY LIVE!!!

zebra spider live count: 10 survivors and they now eat live melanogastors without me needing to pre kill them. I bought them 2 under cabinet lights and they love it. I also bought a rack from Home Depot and now they are housed much better.

The Audax slings are almost a month old now, they are on to hydei flightless flies and are RAVENOUS. I feed them every other day and it takes about 2 1/2 hours.

Mama Phyllis laid another sac a week after she left the first nest. Now there are over 200 Audax slings in my house. The newest ones who came out three days ago all live communally in a 2ft by 1ft clear plastic cheezeball container with pinholes in it and a lady stocking for a top.

I have only had three losses that I know of, including one where it got ready to jump at a fly and hit his sibling by mistake and when he realized his mistake he doubled down and just ate him.

It took a few days but I managed to get room and light for them all and now I have fly cultures that I’ve been keeping going by myself and trying to breed crickets for pinheads too but if you look at crickets cross-eyes they all die. The best way to keep crickets alive is to feed them a commercial water food mix gel or wafoo, no drinking water, no fruit or veg besides the occasional teeny slice of potato, put a 8w heating mat underneath and forget about them until you need to feed them or feed them TO stuff. They are just generally weak af. They will actually gorge on water or water based food until they over saturated and die.

But the update is very happy! All living happily and getting ready to be adopted by spooder lovers in my groups

I think there was someone on here asking if anyone was selling Salticus scenicus.

 

[ThatSquareChick]

I think there was someone on here asking if anyone was selling Salticus scenicus.

wish I knew who they were, I have a very limited number and I’d like to keep one or two for myself