Sling feeding?

[Case]

Hey all. I'm sure this has been covered before, but I wonder if I could ask some advice for caring for slings?
I just got 3 slings that are about 3/8" or so. I've had them for a couple days and decided to see if they were hungry.
At the local pet store, I got some crickets that are about the same size as the spiders - they didn't have any smaller ones. I put one cricket in each container. Each one of the slings ran away from the crickets.
Now I'm wondering:
Are the crickets too big?
Since the slings are not eating them right away, should I remove the crickets lest they harm or stress the slings?
Or should I kill the crickets and leave them in?

I also got some flightless fruit flies in case the crix are too big. Has anyone used these to feed slings? Should I try these instead? Even next to the little spiderlings, these fruit flies are really tiny.

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

Case

 

[MrT]

Crush the crics. heads. The slings should eat then.


Ernie

 

[rob]

Yep...

I crush the crickets heads and place them in with the slings. Even when you crush their heads, they twitch a little. My slings will usually eat dead crickets anyway even if they don't twitch.

 

[Case]

Thanks!

Thanks for the advice guys.
I had just read Ernie's post and went to crush the heads ("Headcrusher! I crush your head!" heh) and discovered that one of the slings had killed and was feasting on its cricket. And the cricket is as big as it is! Way to go, sling!
I crushed the other two cricket heads. Thanks!

Case

 

[SpiderTwin]

If you do some reading, a general rule is don't feed a T anything bigger than 1/2 it's size. If you fed crickets that were the same size as the T, they were too big. Since you can't find pinhead crickets, the above advice is good to smash the crickets head so you don't take the chance of injuring the spiderling.

 

[68v]

I've been giving my slings termites. Just go out in the woods for a walk and roll over a couple logs and you find a nice batch of termites. I keep them in a butter dish with mulch covering keep it moist and the termites last months drop a couple in every day and the slings are doing great! They really seem to like them and they are small for little slings. Works for me! Good luck.