Vicareux' P.sazimai growth diary

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
Joined
Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
I have received 5 of these slings as a gift from a friend. I didn't start the diary at the time since i felt a bit overwhelmed with the number of slings i had at the time, but now that the dust has settled, i decided its a nice checkpoint to start keeping a diary on these fellas. I have decided to give away 2 of them at some point, so i will keep track of only 3 of them.

Characters in this diary:
PS1, nickname "Starfish" - this fella actually molted 3 days ago, and sits at a comfortable 1 inch.
1.jpg

PS2, nickname "Baby blue" - I have no idea when this fella molted last. Sits at a slightly higer than 2cm mark, which is something less than an inch
1.jpg

PS3,Nicknamed "Pilot" - I also have no idea when this one molted last, but sits at a 1 inch mark.
( If you're wondering why "Pilot" - this fella jumps out of its burrow when i drop food, that at one point i saw it airborne for a fraction of a second )
1.jpg

Temperament: As slings, they are very skittish, and will run or hide deep in their burrows on a slight disturbance. Though they have very good appetites and reject food only in premolt. ( PS3 is wild when it comes to feeding as mentioned above )
Housing: I've noticed one thing that are somewhat inconvenient when it comes to their burrows. They push the substrate from the middle of the enclosure and stick them to the walls, making a "bowl" shape out of their substrate. Then at some point, they choose a corner and dig a vertical burrow, and when they hit the bottom, they bulldoze a perimeter around on the bottom. Every one of the 5 slings did this. So here's the problem: when i drip the water down into the substrate, it will slide right into their burrow and flood the whole perimeter. At one point i had a sling completely submerged because of this, and i had to take water out (It's PS1, in it's old deli-cup enclosure).
So, i took a small acrylic container, filled around a half of the container with substrate, so they will make the entire container their burrow when they push the substrate out to the edges from the middle, which will eliminate the submerging problem.
Growth rate: It's decent, they grow somewhat quick but nowhere near as fast as A.geniculatas, but faster than T.albopilosus, but we will see this in detail in the future.

I am feeding them with small B.lateralis roaches so far, but i will write a more specific info on feeding on each update like i do in my A. geniculata diary .
I will also update on the temperatures at every update.

And since i don't know specific instars, they will have a different sheet format compared to A.geniculatas.
Sheet.png

I have fun keeping diaries, and hopefully somebody will have fun reading these in the future!
 

LucN

Arachnobaron
Old Timer
Joined
Jan 22, 2009
Messages
315
Ohhh, P. sazimai now, Huh ? We'll see if you get equally lucky with these 3 as you were with the genics in your other thread.
 

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
Joined
Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
Ohhh, P. sazimai now, Huh ? We'll see if you get equally lucky with these 3 as you were with the genics in your other thread.
Hopefully, though these are not as interesting as geniculatas i must admit, so i dont mind males of these either :lol:
I think they are a bit boring to me now until they get their colors lol
 

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
Joined
Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
Both PS2 and PS3 molted on the same day today.

Not much size gain by PS2, some size gain on PS3.

PS2
_MG_0172.JPG

PS3
_MG_0171.JPG

Average room temp. through molt cycle: 20°C/68°F
Food type and frequency: Lateralis nymph every 7-10 days.

PS Sheet.png
 

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
Joined
Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
PS1 Molted today. Doesn't look like it gained much size, but i am not able to get a good look at it since it's in its burrow.
Image will follow as soon as i catch it out

Growth rate is much slower than i expected.
PS Sheet.png
 

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
Joined
Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
PS2 molted. Growth rate is starting to pace up
They are incredibly boring to keep, always in their burrows and super easily scared :rofl:
But nevertheless, i've managed to catch PS2 a little out of its burrow just enough for a photo. I only manage to see legs of PS1,so no images of that one yet.
_MG_0288.JPG
PS Sheet.png
Average room temp. through molt cycle: 24°C/75°F
Food type and frequency: Dubia nymph every week or two.

Interesting update, decided to mess around with the molt, and look at that!
_MG_0311.JPG
_MG_0315.JPG
 

LucN

Arachnobaron
Old Timer
Joined
Jan 22, 2009
Messages
315
Always hiding in their burrows, huh ? Maybe in a year from now, when they've gained a bit of size, they'll also feel more confident to show themselves ? Like your geniculata and albopilosus threads, I'll keep an eye on this one too. Love seeing the increase in size with each molt.
 

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
Joined
Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
Always hiding in their burrows, huh ? Maybe in a year from now, when they've gained a bit of size, they'll also feel more confident to show themselves ?
Hopefully! So far i'm not noticing anything appealing to P.sazimai except for their blue color (which is a long wait for it to appear, the best i've got was just some slightly blue setae freshly after molting,which somehow disappears a few days later). Mediocre appetites, mediocre growth rate, always underground :rofl:
 

Olan

Arachnoangel
Old Timer
Joined
Dec 23, 2002
Messages
857
Eventually they abandon their burrows. Then you will get the very feisty attitudes. Almost like little blue Phormictopus, threat posing and slapping everything.

but they do grow pretty slow. Have patience
 

AlbaArachnids92

Arachnoknight
Joined
Jun 26, 2021
Messages
177
Nice one on sexing that moult, agree it looks pretty female!

I have a suspected male hitting about the 3inch mark now, as above mentioned, totally abandoned its burrow and last time I opened the enclosure I had to chase it around the table top avoiding threat poses and slaps :rofl:
 

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
Joined
Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
Eventually they abandon their burrows. Then you will get the very feisty attitudes. Almost like little blue Phormictopus, threat posing and slapping everything.

but they do grow pretty slow. Have patience
I ain't in a hurry, i'm satisfied with my collection. But others who may look into a non-boring sling to grow up, this is not the one :rofl:
 

nicodimus22

Arachnomancer
Arachnosupporter
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Sep 26, 2013
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715
Oh, they'll get more exciting. Once they hit around 3 inches, they lose their photosensitivity and stay out in the open all the time, AND they start with the threat poses every time you open the enclosure. The two P. saziami specimens I have give me more threat poses than the other 61 tarantulas combined.
 

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
Joined
Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
Oh, they'll get more exciting. Once they hit around 3 inches, they lose their photosensitivity and stay out in the open all the time, AND they start with the threat poses every time you open the enclosure. The two P. saziami specimens I have give me more threat poses than the other 61 tarantulas combined.
Exciting :rofl: I hope they get solid blue by then! The one of the sazimais i gave away to a friend already started showing a lot of blues :shifty:
 

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
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Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
PS3 molted. Barely any size gain, barely any color change. I have them for a year now.
_MG_0211_1.jpg

PS Sheet.png

Average room temp. through molt cycle: 24°C/75°F
Food type and frequency: Dubia nymph every week or two.



Opened up the molt, foud a spermatheca looking thing, so most likely female.
sprm.jpg
_MG_0243.JPG
 

LucN

Arachnobaron
Old Timer
Joined
Jan 22, 2009
Messages
315
Hmm... Maybe Pterinopelma are another slow-growing Genus like Aphonopelma/Brachypelma/Grammostola. Given how fairly recently these have entered in the hobby (10+ years or so ?), we don't yet have anecdotal data on longevity like B. hamorii and G. porteri that have been available for many decades. Would be awesome to learn down the line that a female's life expectancy is similar to those.

Keep us posted.
 

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
Joined
Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
PS2 molted, 51 days after its last molt. I had to triple check the specimen labels i made on their boxes. No mistake :rofl:
Unexpected molt, unexpected colors but welcome ones.
It has been pretty hot for the past month, and i couldn't cool down my room as easily. Though it was a slight discomfort to me, i can see that it affected my T's nicely.

Finally some actual blue. It looked dark grey without light, with flash it it undeniably blue.
_MG_0333_1.jpg
PS Sheet.png


Room temp. through molt cycle: Room did not dip under 25°C/77°F even during the night. Reached up to 28C/82F during the daytime.
Food type and frequency: Dubia nymph every week or two.
 

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
Joined
Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
Here's PS2 24hours after the molt. The blues have deepened and solidified quite a bit. Beautiful little thing

_MG_0375.jpg
 

LucN

Arachnobaron
Old Timer
Joined
Jan 22, 2009
Messages
315
Wow ! That's actually pretty good looking ! A shame they tend to be secretive at first. Will be looking forward to more updates.
 

vicareux

A. geniculata worship cult member
Joined
Mar 14, 2020
Messages
496
Wow ! That's actually pretty good looking ! A shame they tend to be secretive at first. Will be looking forward to more updates.
I guess theyre slowly coming out of their "boring" period, after a year of keeping them :lol:
 

GBBFreak

Arachnopeon
Joined
Jul 20, 2022
Messages
16
Hey Vicareux
I also have 3 PS slings growing. Got them 1 1/2 months ago, probably around 1.5cm length, now about 2cm after their molt. Hope they will put on some size during this hoot-@ss summer. :D
Quite funny how you went from "omg boring spiderlings" to "ok that's nice" after that last molt cycle, though. xD
Anyways... *just following* ;-)
Cheers!
 
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