sexing through molted exo.

Lycanthrope

Arachnolord
Old Timer
Joined
Oct 10, 2002
Messages
622
ive read a thousand articles on doing this and just cant seem to get it. ive had 4 seperate molts to try with, including a proven female H.lividum, just to see if i could find what i was looking for. all the molts were a bit shredded in the area of question, so maybe thats my problem. Or maybe im just an idiot lol. anyway my question is, how many of you can actually do this?
 

Botar

Arachnoprince
Old Timer
Joined
Aug 27, 2002
Messages
1,441
I'm pretty much a rookie at that, but I successfully determined the sex of my T. blondi from a molt a while back. I posted the pic on here... you might be able to find it with the search engine in the T forum. My blondi was a male, but someone else posted a exuvium of a female that showed the female parts really well. I don't think it's that hard, if the T cooperates and leaves a fairly in-tact exuvium.

Botar
 

Immortal_sin

Arachnotemptress
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Joined
Jul 17, 2002
Messages
3,952
I can do it fairly competently :)
The T in question needs to be (for me anyway) at LEAST 2-2.5" though.
What you are looking for is a flap, or a small projection, like a leaf, between the first set of book lungs. Just because you don't see it, doesn't mean much though. It could still be an immature male OR female. Some species are really hard to see w/o a microscope.
So far, the easiest for me was the Aphonopelma, Brachypelma, and Pterinochilus spp for sexing.
I use the molt, combined with what their 'underside' (ventral?) looks like to make a fairly educated guess. So far, I've been right.
 

Code Monkey

Arachnoemperor
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Joined
Jul 22, 2002
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3,783
Rookie, in theory, yes. In practice, ehhh... The problem is two-fold. First, the female parts grow bigger and bigger until she reaches maturity, so the lack of spermathecae may or may not mean anything depending on how well you examine it and how old the sling is. Two, the exuvia is much thinner when they're slings which makes manipulation much harder and damage much easier. Microscopic examination for epiandrous fusilae is easier with smaller individuals but, from my limited experience, outside the reach of anyone who doesn't have a fair amount of experience working with a microscope (I know I don't have it down to where I'd call myself particularly reliable and I've logged thousands of hours assessing cell morphology at a job).
 

Vayu Son

Avatar of Anansi
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Joined
Jul 19, 2002
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My recent Pamphobeteus nigricolor had small little alien antenna swellings of the spermethecae which are easy to identify, since they are protruding(even though flat against the opisthoma(abdomen).

-V
 

MrT

Arachnoking
Old Timer
Joined
Aug 13, 2002
Messages
2,171
My B. colloratvillosum just 10 mins. ago came out of its hide after being sealed up for a few days. It was freshly molted and looking pretty.

I got out the molt, soaked it in soapy water for a couple mins. I streched it out on a hunk of styrofoam and went to work trying to straghten it out. After doing so, I used a lamp I bought just for this task, it has a magnifing lense built into it. Only $ 20.00 at Home Depot. Looking for the leaf with the little antenna.

I really couldn't tell much untill I put the black end of my paint brush under the spot between the forward book lungs. AND there it was!!! ITS A FEMALE!!! I'm sooo happy.

By the way, She molted with a cricket in her cage.. But she had the hide completely webbed up. These spiders know what their doing. :D :D

E
 
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