What are your thoughts re: misting

[Elytra and Antenna]

I reared dozens of boehmei from hatchlings with zero die-off and mist them every 4-20 days (dependent on season and age). When they are less than 1" as soon as the substrate becomes bone dry -- it can look dry without being dry. I'm not trying to provide humidity, just offering something to drink without getting excessive water in the cage. If there's a water dish, misting is redundant and can be overkill.

 

[pinkfoot]

This is a tough question. Off the top of my head, yes, most North American Aphonopelma sp. are deserts species. But This is where it becomes a problem. See, a true desert, ie antarcticia or Sahara, are massive and arid.

Most places ie Atacama desert, Somama desert, Mojave desert, Kiliheria desert, are not really deserts.

Somama and kiliheria deserts gets over 200 mm and therefor are not deserts. Most Aphonopelma sp live in these places, not the kiliheria for example only .

Places like the mojave are deserts in the fact that they get less then 200mm, but they have runoff and shallow bedrock, where water from lakes, snowpack, higher elevation runs, usually underground into these areas. So the issue is not rainfall but water table. The local water table can supply even water, year round, into the system.

This water table pools in the underground bed rock and makes what we call oasis. Local vegation suck up the water. Tarantulas and other desert life, use the roots and surrounding pools to dig their home. The roots of the plants suck up moisture. This wicking action saturate the soil up to 100%, even if the water table is 30-100 feet below the tree.

So in places Atacama, ie home of the rosie, does not recieve any noticable rainfall. But water is common enough for humans to survive. The humidity is quite high when the fog banks roll off the pacific. Mountian lakes and snow levels create oasis which life huddles around.

The biggest issue is that tarantulas are predators. The simple fact that they eat prey means that they are going to have to be around vegagation. Plants have to have water, desert species are not easy eaten. So tarantulas can only really exist around water sources.

Even GBBS build tunnels around plant roots. Which increase the humidity.

Rainfall is one factor tempature is another.

If you have 100% humidity at 15C, but if you raise the air temperature to 35C you drop the humidity to 50%.

Just by diging down 1 meter you can drop the temperature by that much. So a dry 15% on the surface, could be 65% in the bottom of the tunnel, this does not include the water that is naturally in the soil, only air humidity from a temperature drop.

So, to answer the question about "true" desert species, yes they exist, but only in there natural nich. Near water sources, 30 to 100 cm down. Tarantula spend most of their time waiting for food to drop in, and therefor must live where food is common enough to sustain life.


There is alot of people that aruge humidity is overated, I disagree with this, but they do have some valiladate points. But the minute we think a molt has gone wrong we say increase the humidity.

The one thing to remember is that locallity of the people. If a person says that they never cared about humidity and never had a bad molt but comes from florida then you can add it up. They are in a high humidity already. If a person increases temp then they need to start to worry about humidity. If a person increase ventalation, they need to increase humditiy. But do a search humidity has been pound into the ground.
thedarkfinder

Yep, mekes a lot of sense.

I'm just wondering about Windchaser's comment regarding misting being 'all but useless'. Several species live in environmental conditions where all precipitation results from fog rolling in, viz. Atacama, so would this not be nature 'spritzing' these species? Just a thought...

 

[Mina]

No need to mist. Just provide a full water dish at all times and he will be happy happy little hair kicking bastard.

LOL! Let me guess, you have one, or have had one? That said my juvie male does not kick. He is totally spastic and races around in circles if I even touch his viv, but he does not kick. My kicker is my genic. He kicks at me when I feed him.

 

[Sarah.S]

Mmmm for full detailed care of your little brachy sling go here

http://www.brachypelmas.co.uk/

she has been breeding and working with brahys for years and so would be most able to give you the exact anwsers you need.

 

[Windchaser]

I'm just wondering about Windchaser's comment regarding misting being 'all but useless'. Several species live in environmental conditions where all precipitation results from fog rolling in, viz. Atacama, so would this not be nature 'spritzing' these species? Just a thought...

The reason that misting is essentially useless as a means of raising humidity is that if you mist in a dry environment the water will evaporate far too quickly to do any good. If you are misting in an environment where the humidity is already higher, then there really wouldn't be much a need to raise the humidity in the first place.

Again, the recommended method for raising the humidity for an enclosure would be to soak the lower portion of the substrate and allow the water to slowly evaporate through the substrate. This would more closely match the environment that a tarantula in arid conditions would experience. You do need adequate ventilation when using this method or you will experience mold and fungus issues.

Another method would be to add a larger water dish again allowing the water to evaporate over time. Small drops of water, such as those you would get from misting, evaporate quite quickly.

The ambient humidity level of the air is not near as important as the moisture content of the substrate. As TheDarkfinder mentioned, the tarantulas' burrows will be located in areas where the soil will contain additional moisture.

 

[Furbijer]

I have a humidifier and my spider room humidity is between 60%-75%. The cage humidity is between 75%-95%. The substrate is pretty much all dried out. Do you think that there is any benefit to dripping water to the bottom of the cages still once a week? The benefits I see with no water is no mite problems and mold is a rare occurance. I have no problem keeping the humidity high with no watering. Although I have a water dish with all spiders over 2 inches anything smaller has none. Do you think I should be misting?

 

[Windchaser]

I have a humidifier and my spider room humidity is between 60%-75%. The cage humidity is between 75%-95%. The substrate is pretty much all dried out. Do you think that there is any benefit to dripping water to the bottom of the cages still once a week? The benefits I see with no water is no mite problems and mold is a rare occurance. I have no problem keeping the humidity high with no watering. Although I have a water dish with all spiders over 2 inches anything smaller has none. Do you think I should be misting?

I wouldn't mist given your environment.