WOOHOO! Found L. hesperus!

[SnakeManJohn]

WOOHOO! Found L. mactans or hesperus!

A very large widow that I found in the crack under the door of the garage. I put my hand under there and pulled leaves from the web a few hours before that not even thinking it could be a widows web. Few hours later, I walk outside barefooted, almost stepping on it.

I fed it a very large camel grasshopper or whatever it's called and my parents seemed very interested! At first they were wanting me to kill it right there, I hid it in the garage in a secure container obviously

Is it a female, what's the chances of it being gravid, and how many sacs would you think it will have?

 

[P. Novak]

That is definately a female(females are the only ones that are jet black and have the red hourglass, males have the hourglass but it's not bright red and they aren't jet black like that), and from the looks of it she could be gravid esp. since she's wild caught.

The setup you have now is perfectly fine. Good luck and don't get bit. Respect her more then anything.

I'm pretty sure you have either Latrodectus mactans or Latrodectus hesperus. I'm not familiar with ranges.

 

[SnakeManJohn]

Awesome! I figured she was gravid...okay, now..how long after until I remove the carcass from the container? I believe this was one of her biggest meals, when I pulled the rest of the web out to check if there was a sac or any other widows up there, I seen A LOT of these small tiny baby pincher bug carcasses that I have running around on the outside garage wall. I'm going to check tomorrow again around the siding of the garage if there's any more, I'm so excited haha.

 

[P. Novak]

When I had my widows; I really never removed them since there was no substrate and it wasn't moist mites would never come. The only time I really removed them was when I transfered them to a new enclosure. Good luck on finding more, and be careful.

 

[SnakeManJohn]

Yup, I sure will, and thanks

Also, do they lay a lot of successful sacs? I read Kugellager's laid more than 20 sacs!

 

[P. Novak]

Yup, I sure will, and thanks

Also, do they lay a lot of successful sacs? I read Kugellager's laid more than 20 sacs!

I'm not sure if this applies for all Latros, but for hesperus and mactans they lay till they die once they have been mated once. This of course is from experience, and reading.

 

[SnakeManJohn]

:drool: :clap: I'm sure you can tell I'm in a happy mood ;-)

I believe it is an L. mactans, I read on http://www.uvm.edu/~rtbell/Widow.html. My widow has 2 VERY VERY faded red dots on it's dorsal, the ventral, it looks the same as both mactans and hesperus. I look closer up, and it's got 2 faded white dots on the dorsal also..chances are..it's a mactans.

 

[P. Novak]

Haha, I can tell alright. Yeah that's what I was thinking as well, just by going where you were located at, but who knows these two species are very similar. They are usually identified by location. It's hard though when the two species cross over each others natural habitat.

 

[Widowman10]

dang, you already figured out it was a hesperus. i was going to say that until i scrolled down more. i second the hesperus as i've had many and they have a very nice looking hourglass.

 

[SnakeManJohn]

I will get another picture after it's done feeding on this hopper, its hourglass is PERFECT and very very bright red! Man..you should have seen me last night...I almost died! This widow is so big, I could see it's body mass in the complete dark!

 

[TNeal]

That's really cool. Enjoy her but be wary. I did learn from past experience that they are a slow spider and not to much to worry about if you drop one. Mine stayed on it's web when I accidently dropped her on to the floor. I just picked her up, her web was on a stick, and placed her into the jar she came from.

I have 2 female L. hersperus and I think they are awesome. If you get slings I would use coffee filters and rubber bands to cover the jar with. So the slings don't escape. What do you experienced keepers think?

Tom

 

[P. Novak]

That's really cool. Enjoy her but be wary. I did learn from past experience that they are a slow spider and not to much to worry about if you drop one. Mine stayed on it's web when I accidently dropped her on to the floor. I just picked her up, her web was on a stick, and placed her into the jar she came from.

I have 2 female L. hersperus and I think they are awesome. If you get slings I would use coffee filters and rubber bands to cover the jar with. So the slings don't escape. What do you experienced keepers think?

Tom

That sounds perfect. The holes in coffee filters are too small from them to fit through, or let's hope so.