Velvet Spider help!

[Veno Manus]

This is our 3rd Velvot and for some reason they keep dieing. Care is pretty on point and have been keeping the conditions pretty accurate to what I've read and been told. We have had 2 sling(ish) pass away and now our sub adult is seeming like its lifeless. Its not in a molt due to a recent molt less than a month ago. Its plump enough to not be malnourished. It gets fed well enough to not suspect any food shorting. About the end of the month my wife will spray a sprits and I mean sprits of mist. Barely enough to really do much but enough. Just struggling with keeping them and ive known them to be pretty sensitive. I hate seeing my wife sad about them having issues due to them being some of her favorite species. Any help or care info would be amazing.

 

[goofyGoober99]

Aw man that sucks.
I've had mine for around 8 months or so (so still pretty tiny). She lives in a vial of sphagnum moss and eats mainly mealworm chunks and (very) occasionally fruit flies. So far I have done no additional moisture, which seems to be the prevailing recommendation these days.


@Charliemum you have a solid amount of experience with these guys right? Do you have any advice?

 

[Charliemum]

Aw man that sucks.
I've had mine for around 8 months or so (so still pretty tiny). She lives in a vial of sphagnum moss and eats mainly mealworm chunks and (very) occasionally fruit flies. So far I have done no additional moisture, which seems to be the prevailing recommendation these days.
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@Charliemum you have a solid amount of experience with these guys right? Do you have any advice?

Yes I have kept 7 sp out of the velvets and ladybirds.
First off op I am so sorry for your loss its never nice to loose any spider n my heart goes out to you.

Right down to the spoods.
Set up is pretty simple dry sub sticks leaf litter and moss, really good air flow, I fed mine twice a week as tiny baby's and once a week as adults, I kept no water dish but would offer a droplet of water when it's been unreasonably hot or they have just moulted. I always offered this in the evening to stop the humidity spiking like it would with day heat. Apart from that I leave them alone.
They are more like widows or false widows in my case , the less you faff the better they seem to do , they do stress very easy if messed with constantly, and don't do well in stuffy environments, always give them alot more room then you think they need .

Now down to your individual Lady, there unfortunately isn't much you can do for her except offer her a droplet of water and maybe some prekilled food in the hope she's just a bit dehydrated.
Don't move her or anything stress isn't good for her right now just try to offer her some water and let her be. Hopefully it will do the trick. And please don't blame your self, spiders are complicated beings and we don't truly understand them, lots of things go wrong and unfortunately we won't ever know what the cause was because we know so little about them, and how they work. I have even had a sling come myself that never ate or webbed or moved tbh, little one passed about a week after they came, I bought 5 at the time all the others matured, had np but that 1 just didn't thrive. Care was the same set up was the same, they came from the same seller even, sometimes they just have problems we can't see.
I hope your girl gets better please update us on her progress. Sending hope n well wishes for her and yous

 

[Wolfram1]

i feel like there isn't enough information in that post to answer the question.

what is the ventilation like?

the most common issue is the balance of moisture vs. ventilation and it is also the most common reason for sudden unexplained deaths.

now based on your post you seem to be aware of that and act accordingly, but you haven't included the information to let us judge the situation ourselves.

a picture of the setup and the ventilation would have sufficed.

even if thats not it, it would be important to see the setup in order to form better theories.

 

[DontFearSpiders]

The food you feed her. Are they wild caught or bought? I'm not sure if this is relevant but it may be a cause if its continuesly. But I'm no expert, so maybe follow Charliemum advice! I hope your spider is okay!

 

[Veno Manus]

So im a scorpion guy and there's a big reason for that lol. Scorpions to me seem to be much more resilient and hearty compared to spiders but with my experience with spiders is not small but well rounded amongst certain species. Was pretty involved in jumpers a while back and had some really cool species. Our current one is doing pretty well.

Velvet spiders however have been tricky with us. Conflicting info amongst the internet and stores and breeders have had us just going gut. But mentioning ventilation now has me questioning the way we have been housing them. We have a very young sling in a vile still with sphagnum moss as its base. Seems to be in on good terms. The adult however is in a small cubical sized Tarantula Cribs style enclosure. So I think that's where we may have gone wrong. It has ventilation but only limited venting. I've been told they dont like big open space, they like to seclude themselves or they require smaller enclosures. So our info has been pretty much trial and error. I've always felt that the enclosure was a tad small and could use some more width at least to stretch all those legs but you work with what ya know and got right? So maybe I think we will change tactics here and try to open up the space and bit more for the ratios in terms of legs space I'll say. It had seemed to be doing very well for quite a while and not exactly 100% on lifespan or true size as an adult or sub adult. I have a slight suspicion it could be WC but we do know that it seemed to be healthy. We do checks everyday on our critters and juat so happened to notice it wasn't responding like normal. My wife tried to give it somw water thinking the dehydration thought mentioned earlier but that didn't seem to be a case. Haven't tried prekilled items seeing as there is little signs to response.

Appreciate yall reaching out and chiming in on this. Id truly like to be able to get my wife a good solid velvet cause she want the bigger species but can't seem to find somone who actually know what they are talking about. Most people we talk with have little info or have to go back on what they think is the species or care.

 

[DontFearSpiders]

I had a velvet spider a while back. One of the larger ones, she was probably about 4cm- 6cm? I don't know if that's big, but it's quite big here. Anyways, was wild caught, and honestly, quite aggressive, but I kept her in a pickle jar container, The fat round jars, with a little bit of substrate at the bottom and then just filled 3/4 with spagnum moss and I poked a few holes in the lid. She immediatly started making a little tunnel and I fed her a mealworm about.. what? Once a week? She was a very defensive spider, whenever I would walk close to the enclosure she would strike the glass, but I mean she was adorable, so that more than made up for that. But I think I kept her for a few months, on a diet consisting of mealworms every week and then I can't remember if I misted her but I don't think so. But she thrived! very pretty spider, I had to eventually release her where I found her, but great experience!

 

[NocturnalSkies]

Dry sphagnum moss, high ventilation and no spraying or misting. They’re very sensitive to moisture.