she's dead...i think

[Scorpendra]

i checked on my Ts this morning, and something seemed a little...off about my L. violaceopes. she wasn't moving, but she was frozen in this pose. i couldn't put my finger on it, since she's not in a death curl, but she just stayed like that when i moved the tank around, blew on her, and moved her leg with my tongs. a tarantula can die without curling up, right?

also, i noticed some kind of yellowish thing which you can see in the second picture. it seemed almost like the shed skin of a pupa, which further supports my "she is dead" theory. really sucks since she was my first OW and i've had her for almost 3 1/2 years.

Rob Kuhn

 

[Spyder 1.0]

Sorry man. This has happened twice to me, both around the same size as well. I've seen this happen many times before on arachnoboards where juviniles just up and die one morning.

This is my favorite species, but the breeding stock we have captive must have a genetic flaw.

 

[Mack&Cass]

I agree with spyderowner...ours just randomly died a couple weeks ago, it was about 2" and had molted 3 times with us and we thought it was doing great...then we were feeding and we looked and it was dead

 

[Bazzgazm]

wc or cb?

i can imagine an internal parasite too... there are some insects that lay eggs inside others that eat their way out. scower the enclosure for a beetle?

 

[Scorpendra]

i took a look around the tank after i examined the yellow shell....i didn't see anything, so it could have burrowed underneath the substrate.

i got her as a cb sling.

 

[Drachenjager]

Sorry man. This has happened twice to me, both around the same size as well. I've seen this happen many times before on arachnoboards where juviniles just up and die one morning.

This is my favorite species, but the breeding stock we have captive must have a genetic flaw.

i don't think that is the case ,. I think the keepers have a flaw in husbandry . I have said it before and I will say it again,. We know way too little to be acting like we know it all.

in fact we know to little to say we know anything lol

 

[Endagr8]

I disagree with you Drachenjager; I had four LV slings that I kept in the same conditions and one randomly died. Its three remaining siblings have molted twice since then.

 

[Spyder 1.0]

I agree we don't know much, but when we keep multiples in the exact same conditions and some die for no reason, there has to be some underlying condition.

If I get a sac from either one of my females in the future I plan on keeping all the slings to do some sort of meager research and see what percent don't make it, and at which stage. Hopefully I will be a grad student by then and I could set something up with my university.

 

[Scorpendra]

after i checked to see if she would move, i wondered if her exuvium hardened on her, since she was in premolt for a conspicuously long time. but the picture in one of my books looks way more gnarled than she did. that's when i noticed the shell.

Rob

 

[Scorpendra]

i still find it strange that she was without any shadow of a doubt dead but not in a death curl.

 

[vvx]

i don't think that is the case ,. I think the keepers have a flaw in husbandry . I have said it before and I will say it again,. We know way too little to be acting like we know it all.

in fact we know to little to say we know anything lol

I think the survival rate in captivity is probably much higher than that in the wild. In the wild the weak are killed/die much quicker while in captivity they often live long lives and pass their lesser genes on to their babies. So the occasional death, I don't assume it's husbandry - after all, if we were to mimic the wild exactly we'd probably have 10x more deaths, and it would be normal and natural.

 

[absoluteyellow]

I disagree with you Drachenjager; I had four LV slings that I kept in the same conditions and one randomly died. Its three remaining siblings have molted twice since then.

All your slings might have survived if you had perfect husbandry (whatever that means). It could be genetic also. Or it could be both.