Spermathecae sexing of Poecilotheria rufilata

[Wenzer]

My 2.5" P. rufilata kicked it's molt out today and I was curious to see if I could find anything. I've been sort of suspecting male because I "think" I can see the dot described by others when ventrally sexing, but thought it couldn't hurt to take a look at the molt and get some hands-on learning!

Unfortunately I could not get any pictures of the molt and haven't had a good enough photo opportunity for a ventral shot, but I wondered if anyone could spare some advice/thoughts?

From what I've read and from viewing the gallery here, Poecilotheria generally have smaller spermathecae and are harder to see until their leg span is on the larger side (since they've got legs for days I guess, lol). When I was looking at the molt, I could see a small "line" across the area where the epigastric furrow would be, it was noticable to the naked eye, at least (and with a backlight). I couldn't easily tell if there was evidence of a uterus externus before I accidentally ripped it

At 2.5" DLS, would it even be possible to see spermathecae yet with the naked eye? Seeing the line gave me a tiny bit of excitement since I know that P. rufilata have fused spermathecae, but it could have easily been something else I'm sure. But I'm not sure exactly "what else" that could be?

 

[BoyFromLA]

Below post might give you some helpful insight how to:

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[Wenzer]

Below post might give you some helpful insight how to:

Early Sex Determination of Tarantulas

Hello 👋 all arachnid keepers&breeders, While raising tarantulas, I’ve always wondered how early they could be sexed. There are some good posts here tackling this issue, and I wanted to share my experience with sexing tarantulas. I use a microscope to observe molts, with x40 ~ x500 zoom. As...

arachnoboards.com

Thank you! I actually was reading that thread just a few days ago, I do wonder if similar presentation of spermathecae at that small of size could be a universal thing of tarantulas, or if it's family/genus/species specific? I really need to get a good microscope haha!!

If it's applicable to Poecilotheria species, I suppose then it could be possible that I could see spermathecae forming with the naked eye, with the help of good lighting. I'll keep my fingers crossed though and check again next molt, or maybe if I can get a good ventral pic!

 

[Ultum4Spiderz]

Thank you! I actually was reading that thread just a few days ago, I do wonder if similar presentation of spermathecae at that small of size could be a universal thing of tarantulas, or if it's family/genus/species specific? I really need to get a good microscope haha!!

If it's applicable to Poecilotheria species, I suppose then it could be possible that I could see spermathecae forming with the naked eye, with the help of good lighting. I'll keep my fingers crossed though and check again next molt, or maybe if I can get a good ventral pic!

Once molt is 2-3” minimum you should be able to tell . Hard part is getting a good molt back when I had pokies they kept destroying them . I don’t know the microscope method nor do I have one . Most I’ve used was a magnifying glass ..

 

[Wenzer]

Once molt is 2-3” minimum you should be able to tell . Hard part is getting a good molt back when I had pokies they kept destroying them . I don’t know the microscope method nor do I have one . Most I’ve used was a magnifying glass ..

Thankfully my rufilata sling didn't destroy the molt, but I was waiting for a week or so to see if I'd be allowed to take it his hiding spot/partial burrow is mostly visible from the back of the enclosure and I could see the molt sitting there, but I wasn't going to dig for it since it's not that important to me, I've just been really curious! I would have had to destroy that half of the cage anyways if I tried.

I did get some decent ventral photos today, which still make me think male if I disregard whatever I saw in the molt. I'm going to add them to the gallery and maybe get some others' opinions