Jake94
Arachnopeon
- Joined
- Jul 6, 2016
- Messages
- 20
I made a post a few weeks ago about my P. irminia sling who has stopped eating. I think it has been 2 months or more now since the little thing has eaten. It kills the crickets I give it, but then just leaves them alone to rot and stink up the place. When I first learned what had been happening I immediately did a rehouse and asked for advice here. A few people suggested it might just be post-molt behavior, which seems impossible at this point. Another few suggested I raise the humidity, so I did try that even though I was pretty sure it had okay humidity, because it always has a full water dish (bottle cap), and the soil is never allowed to dry out. But after a few days of using lukewarm water to try and increase the humidity, it hadn't eaten, so I tried to take out a quarter to a third of the damp substrate and replaced it with dry substrate. That hasn't worked either. I'm thinking I've run out of options and am just waiting for him to die, or to finally correct itself somehow and eat the crickets I've been offering. I figured I would check in once more to see if there's anything else worth trying.
Here's a pic: http://i.imgur.com/KHzoplB.jpg
You can sort of see his abdomen in the picture. It's hanging down behind the water dish to the very right.
I keep the room warm with a space heater, which is always on 70 or higher, usually 72-75, and during the day my two lizards' heat lamps are turned on which are directly adjacent to where I keep my spider enclosures, so I don't think temp is the problem, since everyone else seems to be doing just fine.
Just to clarify, he kills the crickets and starts making a web mat just like all of my other spiders, but 15-20 minutes after he has dropped the cricket and is mostly ignoring it. I have seen him drop a dead cricket, leave it for a while, then come back to it and pick it up into his jaws again, but everytime that I end up having to take the carcass from him, it is almost entirely entact, save for the head which is usually just a black soupy glob. I sometimes think maybe he is getting some nutrients out of the head, but I also think that maybe the damage I see is just from the venom and that he hasn't actually ingested any of it.
Any advice appreciated, I've mostly accepted there's nothing I can do for him except what I already have been.
Here's a pic: http://i.imgur.com/KHzoplB.jpg
You can sort of see his abdomen in the picture. It's hanging down behind the water dish to the very right.
I keep the room warm with a space heater, which is always on 70 or higher, usually 72-75, and during the day my two lizards' heat lamps are turned on which are directly adjacent to where I keep my spider enclosures, so I don't think temp is the problem, since everyone else seems to be doing just fine.
Just to clarify, he kills the crickets and starts making a web mat just like all of my other spiders, but 15-20 minutes after he has dropped the cricket and is mostly ignoring it. I have seen him drop a dead cricket, leave it for a while, then come back to it and pick it up into his jaws again, but everytime that I end up having to take the carcass from him, it is almost entirely entact, save for the head which is usually just a black soupy glob. I sometimes think maybe he is getting some nutrients out of the head, but I also think that maybe the damage I see is just from the venom and that he hasn't actually ingested any of it.
Any advice appreciated, I've mostly accepted there's nothing I can do for him except what I already have been.