Hello nature fans of Steemit. Tonight's Daily Nature Fix is a little peek into my personal life. I'm one of those people that tend to collect hobbies. Basically, anytime I see or hear of something that sounds fun, or interesting, or exciting... I give it a try. Some of my hobbies include woodworking, oil painting, hiking, gold prospecting, sculpting, special fx/makeup, photography, keeping reptiles and insects, golfing, etc. The subject of today, however, is tarantulas.
I've been keeping tarantulas for about a decade now. As with other animals I've kept, I usually try to breed them in captivity and these spiders are no different. This story is about a species called the Brazilian Salmon Pink Birdeater, or Lasiodora parahybana. It's the 3rd largest species of tarantula in the world. I have one large female who's legspan is about 8 inches diagonally.
^^^ This is the exoskeleton from her last molt (shedding). Her name is Shelob.
I acquired two males of this species from a reptile expo in February of 2015. I fattened up the female for several weeks and then introduced the first male for the first breeding attempt. Apparently, I didn't fatten her up enough though. She immediately pounced on the male and ate him, which is always a sad thing to see. Males only live for a matter of months once they reach sexual maturity, however, so he was near the end of his lifespan. Another silver lining to that male being eaten is that in provided a massive meal for an already fat female, so she wasn't hungry a week later when I introduced the second male. That male successfully mated with her. Over the next few weeks, her abdomen started getting larger and larger, despite going back to somewhat regular feedings. A few months later, she webbed herself into a tent in the corner of her enclosure and I could tell she was beginning to produce an egg sac.
^^^A pretty large sized egg sac. Not the prettiest thing, but I was super excited to see it.
About 25 days after she laid it, I wrestled the egg sac off of her to incubate the eggs manually.
^^^The first look inside! Tons of tiny eggs..
I ended up with 2,570 eggs! That's a pretty decent clutch size for this species. I'd say around 200 of them were infertile or otherwise not viable. As you can see in the photo above, the eggs are tiny little yellow balls about 50% the size of a BB.
^^^ Here is an egg under magnification. I apologize for it not being the clearest, but I was using a homemade microscope rig for a cell phone, shooting through a laser pointer lens.
The eggs developed well and within just another 2 or 3 weeks, the eggs hatched into the first life stage of the spider. It's a stage referred to as "Eggs With Legs" (or EWL). It's called that for obvious reasons... the abdomen is still incredibly round and yellow colored, except it now has legs and a carapace sticking out the side. It's a pretty goofy looking critter at this point.
^^^And egg with legs. Still photographed using my microscope rig and it's still about the size of a BB.
^^^A short video of an EWL stretching it's limbs!
After aging for a few more weeks, the eggs with legs shed their skin and finally start to look like a normal spider. These baby tarantulas are called spiderlings.
^^^Now a spiderling. The change from after just one molt is quite dramatic.
It's amazing to see such a large tarantula species start life as being so tiny. Ironically, a lot of species that are smaller as adults are much larger than these L. parahybanas when they're babies. They usually only have around 120 eggs in a sac though, as opposed to the 2,500+ I got here.
Thanks for reading! I hope you found this interesting, even if you hate spiders. I used to be 100% hardcore arachnophobic. Introduction and exposure to the spiders has obviously broken my fears. I've learned that spiders aren't out to hurt you, they actually take out the insects that are. Spiders are welcome in our home now. I just move the larger ones outside. Please shoot me an upvote if you enjoyed this post and make sure you follow me so that you never miss a Daily Nature Fix! - Adam
***Daily Nature Fix is a daily blog showcasing the natural world. It is all original content using photos, stories, and experiences from my own travels.***