#47 - CASA DE TARANTULA #3

Before I continue with more Tales from the Field I wanted to return to my Casa de Tarantula series. Two and a half years ago I left Seattle for good to return to the Chicago area. As I've mentioned in previous installments of KMBHS, I came back with no creatures other than my now dear departed dog Taylor and my 25 year old dusky Pionus parrot Jesse. In a very short time I had rebuilt a sizable tarantula collection and bred quite a few species including a handful of rare spiders that were the first American breedings.

When my mate Mark Pennell was hear with his wife Kim and daughter Brandon a couple months ago I had a small party that included a number of my good tarantula friends. Mark and Kim are my fellow British Tarantula Society committee members. In addition to being one of my best friends and my tattoo artist, Mark also is the BTS webmaster and he and Kim are responsible for putting on the BTS lectures each year. Local arachno-enthusiasts included Jaimie Little, Jason Newland and both Randy Jr. and Randy Sr. Martinez. Minnesota was represented by Chad Campbell and David Lawrence. Michigan was represented by John Apple and Norman Culp. I appreciate the travelers for making the journey, none more so than the Pennell's who came from the UK via Amsterdam. My bonus dad Joel and my sister Lisa were here as well. Jason brought some amazing wings from Corner Pub in Naperville and I ordered in some pizza. The Randy's brought a meat and cheese platter and just about everyone had brought some beer and whiskey. We had a blast. It was the first time I had shown off my spider room to anyone. Previously only Jason and Randy Jr. had seen it. Both have helped me care for my spiders and Randy did so when I was in Sri Lanka for almost a month. I'm sure everyone was impressed. Actually, come to think of it, John Apple had seen it on one quick previous visit when Mark first visited the USA in October 2014 and the three of us plus Andy Daugherty went out to dinner on Mark's first night. However, to me, the most impressive thing about my spider room is that it all was created in two years. I imported spiders and power fed them and had a breeding operation up and running in record time. It is just one jam-packed spare bedroom's worth of spiders and pales in comparison to the big facility I had in Nashville, but I still enjoyed sharing what I had built with my party guests.

But now it is being torn down ... I have had a big clearance sale and will only be keeping a small collection of tarantulas. My "small" is probably much more that the average hobbyists "large", but many different enclosures are being emptied this week as I ship out the large number of spiders I have sold. So, I thought I better post a few photos here in the blog of my spider room this morning and talk a bit about my different enclosures.

This rack isn't going anywhere soon.
The medium enclosures hold Harpactira.
The larger ones on the bottom hold Monocentropus.
The shoeboxes seen at top hold ultimate males in use.

The above enclosures were covered in an earlier blog. They are two types of Homz storage containers from the evil Wal-Mart. All have 2 1/4" hole saw cut vents in front and rear that are covered with aluminum insect screening from the outside. It is affixed with hot glue. The shoeboxes have similar vents cut with a one inch hole saw and covered the same way.

Avicularia condominiums

This is a new enclosure design. I had a large number of Avics I had been growing out that needed to be moved to larger enclosures for breeding. However, I have now since sold all the spiders these were made for: A. versicolor, A. purpurea, A. cf. amazonica, A. geroldi, A. braunshauseni, etc.

The image at left shows the interior. Rather than bothering with installing a dam at the bottom front to retain substrate I decided to use large, flat food storage containers as a pan. This pan is filled with moist coco and covered with a layer of moss. I can almost flood these containers as the spider only rarely comes in contact with the wetness. However, the moisture continually and gradually evaporates to provide essential - and naturally produced - humidity.

The greenery is cut from silk plants obtained from Michael's. To the side I place a cork bark slab that reaches the bottom of the enclosure. This not only provides a potential retreat for the Avics, or at least a place to attach a silken tube, but also allows any crickets or roaches that fall to the bottom of the enclosure a way to climb up where they are more likely to be attacked by the spider.

Note the ventilation holes. At the top, both sides and the rear I make 1" vents in the same manner described above. The next photo will illustrate these better.

Here you can see the hole saw cut holes covered with insect screening. I prefer to provide as much ventilation as possible and have preached this in a number of articles and blog entries.

It's just like a haircut: You can always trim more off, but you can't put the hair back on if you cut it too short. Same thing with ventilation ... A conscientious and attentive keeper will stay on top of moisture levels and can always add more moisture, but one stagnant conditions have been created either a spider dies or you're lucky and it doesn't but you have to tear down and completely rebuild its terrarium.

Ambient humidity varies with where you live and also seasonally in many places. Here in the midwest it is very humid in the summer, but very dry in the winter. You may have to adapt to changes. How much ventilation is necessary will not be the same in all collections. Experiment and find your proper balance. However, in general, it is best to err on the side of a bit too much ventilation rather than too little.

This image shows some gallon jars at the top of the shelf.
However, what I am highlighting here are my new 10 gallon aquariums with polycarbonate fronts.
These hinged door fronts with 2" vents were made for me by Eric's Plastic Shop to my design specifications.
The dimensions of 10 gallon aquariums vary so these fronts are specific to one manufacturer's tanks.
If you ask for some of these to be made choose one brand of aquarium and measure it for Eric.

These cereal container "tree hole retreat" style Poecilotheria enclosures were described
in detail Blog #38. Note the smaller version at top that hold dwarf Avics and Tapinauchenius.

Above you see racks filled with ExoTerra Nano Tall terrariums. I use these for Pachistopelma and small Avicularia such as Avicularia hirschii, A. sooretama, A. rickwesti and even A. diversipes. The gallon jars above hold all sorts of juvenile arboreal tarantulas that are being grown out and, in some cases, penultimate or ultimate males.

I am really not a fan of acrylic enclosures. I've sold or given away almost everyone I've bought over the years. These are popular in many tarantula collections, but I find that they warp, break, scratch and otherwise become crap. However, the 8x8x8 cubes you see on the bottom shelf (there are four more on the other side) are what I use to breed Idiothele mira and I love them for this purpose (the 16 oz. deli cups above contain juvenile I. mira). I still have a few arboreal models left as well and in this image they are holding Avicularia sp. Colombia and, on the far upper right, the largest Poecilotheria metallica I have ever seen. She is 10 years old and completely black and white.

The above photo shows many 32 oz. deli cups and gallon jars being used to raise out Avicularia. Just out of the photo on the top are trays of spiderling/young juvenile Pachistopelma and Avicularia in 50 dram vials with screen ventilation over a one inch hole in the lid. You can see more of these vials in the bottom vial. Excuse me for neglecting to remove the cricket egg carton before taking this snapshot. The large, shallow storage tubs with green lids are everywhere in my spider room and hold all sorts of young spiders being housed in vials.

This shot down the other side of my center island shows more spiders in 32 oz. deli cups, gallon jars and the 10 gallon aquariums oriented vertically with the custom fronts made by Eric Weisheimer.

This final shot shows one wall of various enclosures. Note both the Exo Terra Nano Tall terrariums mentioned earlier and, just out of sight except in the far bottom left of the image, the larger Exo Terra  Mini Tall terrariums that contain adult Poecilotheria. The bottom shelf of all three of these racks hold these Exo Terra enclosures, but my photo cut off the bottom.


This is a glimpse into the enclosures I use. I am a huge fan of Exo Terra terrariums and love my custom storage container enclosures and the polycarbonate fronted 10 gallon aquariums on end. Your basic acrylic spider cages, not so much ...

Feel free to ask any questions in the comments below.

MJ