Tarantula toys!

Jared781

Arachnobaron
Joined
Nov 23, 2011
Messages
555
Inspired by the story of that B. smithi that likes to roll her water dish around, I decided to get my adult rosehair a toy to see what she did with it.

I picked her up a pingpong ball and washed it really well to make sure it didn't have any contaminants, and then I just left it in her container. She didn't do too much with it at first, but I would catch it at different places, presumably because she was moving it around. Sometimes it would be in her hide, sometimes on top of it, sometimes in her water dish.

Right now she's really fiddling with it a lot - she has it in her water dish and she's rolling it over and over and over again, almost as if she's using it like a tarantula exercise machine! {D

It doesn't seem to be bothering her to have it around - in fact, she has been more active "playing" with her toy. Maybe this is the solution to the "pet rock" syndrome. :D

Greensleeves
COOL :)
here's what im goin to do::

Walk to kitchen ----> Open junk drawer ----> Find Ping-Pong Ball ----> Pick up ----> sanitize ----> Toss it too my T :D :D lOl
 

Kraine

Arachnosquire
Joined
May 4, 2011
Messages
51
I am so trying this. Maybe I'll use wooden bird toys with no enamel or paint if I can't find a ping pong ball. My g. pulchra loves (and by "loves" I mean tends to do this often and with gusto) to rearrange his dirt, shelter, and even water (he puts dirt in the water bowl and spreads the soaked dirt around his enclosure). Maybe I'll get to watch some more antics if I give him a toy. :]
 

toast4nat

Arachnosquire
Joined
Mar 20, 2011
Messages
140
I'm very curious about this too, so I put paper balls in with my G. rosea and A. schmidti to see if they'll interact with them somehow. Should be interesting.
 

Kraine

Arachnosquire
Joined
May 4, 2011
Messages
51
Update:

I put a ping-pong ball in with my little g. pulchra male, and he's moved it around his enclosure a couple times. Once to the corner that was closest to me, and then in the morning I found it in his water dish. Not sure what the point of that was, but it's pretty amusing.

Hopefully I can actually catch him doing it! It'd be funny to watch him push that big thing around. Haha.
 

Storm76

Arachnoemperor
Old Timer
Joined
Jan 30, 2012
Messages
3,797
For me that sounds mostly amusing for the keeper, the poor T is most likely just following her natural instincs trying to make some sense of that weird thing in her tank...
 

ElfDa

Arachnopeon
Joined
Apr 28, 2011
Messages
27
oh, I dunno; a little variety is always good. new stimuli and all that.

I offered my ball python an old kitten heel shoe and after thoroughly investigating it, she decided it was a snake bed and slept in it for weeks... until she slept in it after a shedding soak and made it nasty.

My ~3" b. albopilosum sling just got his first water bowl and seems to think it is a foot bath, exclusively. He also really seemed to enjoy flower pots (and a NyQuil cup) in his old enclosures; webbing them thoroughly and sleeping in them. They can't see the object, but they can feel the different textures.
Chewbacca has had a glazed ceramic pot, a terra cotta pot, a NyQuil cup (unused), and a plastic flower pot and, while he would hide in them, he didn't always web them that much.

The plastic flower pot was quite popular, especially once he'd figured out that he could walk up and over "Mt Flower Pot", but the glazed ceramic one was nearly half-obscured by silk and was then tunneled under.

He has a stick and a water "dish", now, and spends most of his time sitting on the wall of his enclosure, now touching either object. maybe I'll give him back his old ceramic pot?

It's nice to watch him explore new items/hides in his environment (and then conquer by webbing it thoroughly and standing atop it).
Hey; leaves fall in nature and can be used as hides-- maybe checking out and appropriating new hides and objects for their hides is part of their natural behavior?

Man, I wish I'd gone to science route, instead of art; I could be squatting in a jungle, watching Ts and recording their (weekly?) movements, right now.
...or hip-deep in grant papers.
 

Kraine

Arachnosquire
Joined
May 4, 2011
Messages
51
You call it a "poor" T when nobody has done a study to see whether ping pong balls/random stimuli negatively effect them or not.

People put plastic plants in tanks all the time for their own designs and amusement. How's that different? xD
 

BCscorp

Arachnoprince
Old Timer
Joined
Oct 22, 2007
Messages
1,125
People put plastic plants in tanks all the time for their own designs and amusement. How's that different? xD
Probably because people putting plastic plants in an enclosure has more to do with providing some semblance of their natural environment and providing places to hide than decorating it for their own amusement.
 

Theist 17

Arachnosquire
Joined
Jan 8, 2012
Messages
50
I put a small round bead in my G. pulchripes enclosure tonight to see what would happen, but nothing special has happened so far. Just walking over our around it since I put it in there.
 

SPIDERBYTE

Arachnoknight
Old Timer
Joined
Apr 17, 2005
Messages
208
Fake golfball rolled around cage.

My A.seemanni likes to use it as a "door" to her lair when she wants privacy :lol
Its not the kind full of holes, but just hollow, similar to a ping pong ball, but larger.
 

Smokehound714

Arachnoking
Joined
Mar 23, 2013
Messages
3,091
My aphonos all will dump their water dish and lodge it into their hides.. It stops getting cute after it becomes annoying lol
 

ParryOtter

Arachnopeon
Joined
Feb 22, 2014
Messages
29
I see this is an old thread that got bumped but I'm still wide-eyed at the person who thought putting their T in a hamster ball and letting it roll around the house for hours was a good idea...

I guess as long as she was "loving it," it's all good. :eek:
 

Formerphobe

Arachnoking
Old Timer
Joined
Feb 27, 2011
Messages
2,336
Funny that this thread should be resurrected today. I noticed this morning that my LP has dragged her ping pong ball out of hiding (I think she'd buried it), and has been moving it about her enclosure.
 
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