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General care Page 2
GENERAL CARE PAGE TWO
Humidity
Humidity is a very important aspect of tarantula keeping. As we have already discussed a water bowl is invaluable but on its own will rarely provide enough humidity.
To check humidity you need a gauge which generally looks like a small round plastic disc with a pointer needle inside. You can buy these from good pet shops/ Garden centres and Entomological suppliers.
Each tarantula specie needs a rather specific humidity count ( see care pages and links) To keep the humidity at the right level is easy,  With a gauge if it is too dry add moisture, too wet let it dry out a little.
The best way to keep moisture at a determined level is to spray with a small plastic hand sprayer as and when more humidity is needed. These can be sourced for very litttle money and can make all the difference to spider/invert care.
Make sure that the sprayer has not been used for other chemicles especially insecticides. If you are unsure, buy a new one and keep it dedicated to your pet's care.
Some spiders eg. B smithi need less humidity than rain forest species, yet need humidity to shed their skins. For the dryer species I only spray one side of their tank and give them 2 plant pot/cork bark caves. One on the drier side and one on the more moist side. They can then choose where they like to live in the tank.

For spiderlings I like to add some sphagnum moss (available from garden centres/good pet shops) . Which again I keep a small patch of damp moss and a small patch of drier moss. They choose where they liket to live!!
Temperature/Heating
Giving your spider the correct temperature is something you must do. They will not thrive and will surely die if you do not provide them with the temperature range they need.
To test the temperature many different types of thermometers are available and a small one could be positioned inside the spiders tank.
There are many ways to heat your spiders cage and we will discuss several options here.

Heat mat- One of the most popular and easy/safe ways to give your spider warmth. These mats are electrical and come in a variety of sizes.
They should always be placed on the outside of your spiders tank. If used properly heat mats are a great and cheap way for you to maintain warmth.
When placing these mats consideration should be given to what type of spider you have.

 A burrowing spider may get too hot if the mat covers the entire base of your tank and so the mat should be placed under half of the tank only. Likewise an arboreal spider will not get the benefit of the heat if it is under the base of the tank and therefore you should place the mat against the back of the tank or on one side that the spider does not sit against.

As the mats are flexible ( like sheets of aluminium foil that have been laminated in plastic) you may play around with positioning as you test the temperature.
If the temperature seems too high or low move the mat to cover more/less surface area of the tank, yet always leave some of the heated side unexposed.

Heated Cable- Available from garden centres. These long lengths of cable were designed for seed germination but can be used to heat the vivarium. Again they must be positioned on the outside of your cages. We have used these in the past by making a wooden tray, laying the cable into position and filling it with sand to stand the spider tanks on to. These come in a variety if lengths and many small tanks can be fitted onto a sand box with a large cable. You can design and make the boxes to your own specification and you will find another low cost form of heating.

Light bulbs-When we first started keeping Tarantula's ( way back in the early 80's ) nearly everyone heated their tanks with an ordinary light bulb in an open socket screwed to the ceiling of their tanks.
How silly we were!
Tarantula's really don't like a 60 watt bulb in their tanks. Apart from them not liking bright light. You could not control the temperature very effectively and the poor spider's were often burnt on the hot surface of the bulb!
Do not use this method!
Having said that, a coloured Blue/Red light bulb of low wattage suspended over the tank or in a cabinet containing several tank's can be useful to help heat/light the tank and they do not give too bright a light for the spider. We would only recommend this method when used in conjunction with one of the above.

Electric Propogator- This is a little gem of a heating method we found by buying one in a garden centre sale! These electric seed cabinets are generally plastic and the better models are thermostatically controlled.
The larger ones can house several small pots of slings or a couple of larger spider's.
 We use our's as a heat mat by removing the lid, setting the temperature and voila gentle under heat. The only draw back is the total contact with the bottom of the tank and although some are ridged on the base, giving you warm and cool strips ( ideal ) on the flat based ones we just gently tilt the pots and tanks, reducing contact with the heat.

There are other methods of heating but again these are the ones that have worked for us. Whichever method you use we would always recommend that you link the heat source to a thermostat ( an electric unit that turns your heater on and off as necessary ) These can be sourced cheaply from pet shops, Garden centres and electrical suppliers.

For a large collection of spider's/Invert's you can heat a full room or cabinet even a shed or garage but this is only really for the very rich or passionate hobbyist!
Feeding  
Another imortant step in keeping your spider healthy. Whenever feeding take care not to let your spider out as this is an ideal opportunity to escape.
There are several foods that you can buy or cultivate for yourself and each has its merits for the size of spider you are feeding.

Fruitflies-
 A must for young spiderlings. These tiny flies are a brilliant food source for young spider's.
They can be bought as a culture ( a pot with all life stages in ) and will not harm your spiderling's in any way. They can be awkward to feed as they run/fly for freedom as soon as you open the pot.
 To stop this happening you can chill the flies for a few minutes in the refrigerator ( not too long or they may die ) and this will slow them down.
 A pooter can be used, which is a plastic tube you suck the flies into. Don't worry there is a piece of thin gauze between the fly and your lungs!
 E-mail me for instructions on how to make one.

There are also flightless cultures available that are either too large to fly or have curly wings which are impossible to fly with. These two types I cannot recommend enough! We always have cultures available.
You can grow your own cultures using a small pot with rotting banana in ( smelly ) or you can buy culture medium which is a dry flake you mix with water ( not so smelly and much healthier for the flies) which we also keep in stock.
If you are making your own always make sure the emerging flies have a "ladder" of cotton wool or thick mesh to stand on otherwise they will become swamped in the food source.
Ventilation is also important you can achieve this by using very fine mesh (nylon tights work well!) and an elastic band as the lid.
If you do not have any food and are desperate, in the summer place a mashed up banana outside but undercover and the fruit flies will congregate on this ready for you to catch. This is a very poor method of collecting food as you may only catch a few and you don't know where they have been! Yet again if all else fails.

Crickets-
Probably the most common spider food available.
These come in a variety of sizes from micro-the size of fruit flies to adult about an inch long.
The most common types available are house crickets and black field crickets both are invaluable as a food source but the black crickets have slightly more aggressive tendencies.
Your spider will be very happy to munch on these providing the right size is available. Never feed your spider something much bigger than its abdomen (bottom).
 You can breed crickets relatively easily providing they are warm, have plenty of good food including greens and cereals and that the females have damp sand to lay their eggs into. The crickets diet is very important as whatever makes the cricket healthy also makes your spider healthy when it eats them!
Crickets are also escape artist's and so I always open my pot of crickets in the sink or bath tub. If they do jump out when you only want the one they cannot go anywhere and find it impossible to jump on shiny enamel or metal. ( There is nothing worse than a house full of escapee singing crickets )

Locusts-
Another very important food source that is the next size up from crickets. Keep them in exactly the same way as the crickets to keep your spider's healthy. Young Locusts are called hoppers and are approximately the same size as an adult cricket whereas the adult locust is generally much larger, giving a good sized meal to an adult tarantula.
They are also slower and easier to handle than crickets but can leap huge distances.

Other insects-
Providing they are from safe (no pesticides) areas many insects can be used.
 I would steer clear of any members of the Hymenoptera family ( ants wasps and bees ) but otherwise you can try several insects including roaches and stick insects. Do not use Mantid's they are a top predator themselves and you do not want to find that the tables (and your spider) have been turned.

Pinkies-
Baby mice that have not opened their eyes or have any fur.
I don't personally use pinkies but they can be a very good source of nutrient's in your spider's diet and hobbyists that do use them report excellent results. Make sure that they are only a day or two old because as soon as they get much bigger they will bite back.
I will leave this food source up to you. :0)

Meat on a string-
What? I hear you ask. Yes meat on a string is a good feed that is used in time of lack of insects or just to give the spider some difference in diet every now and again.
If you take a good cut of lean beef etc (about the size of your spider's normal prey item) and tie it around the middle with a piece of cotton. You can dangle this in front of the spider, low to the floor, and the spider should take this as normal prey. Don't worry about the cotton as it will be dropped with any left over food for you to remove later. Make sure that the cotton is long enough not to endanger your fingers and once the spider has dropped the cotton clean it up so that the spider does not get entangled.
I very rarely use this method of feeding but again in times of need it can be a life saver.

Feeding summary-
Whatever food you decide to use it is a good idea to vary it from time to time.
 Don't feed too many items at once( 2 or 3 as a maximum) and don't worry about over feeding as your spider will only eat what it wants (always remember to remove uneaten food items after a day or two). If your spider does stop eating suddenly then it is probably coming up to a "moult"

 

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