first arboreal heeellp haha

arachnoobie

Arachnopeon
Joined
Nov 23, 2009
Messages
33
went to the mall today and poked my head around the pet store.. i found 2 spiders with the god awefull worst living conditons ive ever seen it hurt me to see them. naturally i wanted to help so i bought the A. avic who was in a flat small kritter keeper.. moldy substrate nothing to climb on or hide behind and disgusting dead crickets with mooore mold:embarrassed: i brought him home and moved him into a 3L jar but he has lost most of his hair on his abdomen and is currently very close to black so i am wondering if it is very premolt and shouldnt have moved it from its web / deathly gross house ? thanks for ur inpuuut:?:(

533.jpg
thats his abdomen
 

Teal

Arachnoemperor
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Jan 11, 2009
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4,096
Cute little guy!

I would refrain from handling him until after he's molted and hardened back up :)
It does look like he is in heavy premolt, so keep him warm and moist and under a close eye if you want to try to catch him molting!
 

Arachnoholic420

Arachnoangel
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Mar 25, 2009
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^^^ i agree with looks like premolt.... he shud be fine he got enough mass in his/her abs... in him to survive.... sho she's not dehydrated...
 

Moltar

ArachnoGod
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Apr 11, 2007
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Yep. I think you're right about the premolt. It's good that you moved him out of the old container, considerig how awful it was. Just get him set up in an enclosure appropriate for a juvie Avic (there are plenty of threads on that) and he'll probably molt very soon. I've noticed that T's often molt shortly after being moved to a larger or more appropriate enclosure. I take that as a sign that I did something right.
 

Hobo

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
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Hey, you're sorta from my neck of the woods!
There's an exact same situation near my place, a mall petshop, with an avic kept in almost identical fashion as yours. There used to be two, but I'm almost positive the other has died (It's substrate was swampy, and it's entire back half was soaked and in the mud. I saw it make feeble attempts to climb out, but all of it's legs were caked in wet sub). It wouldn't happen to be a "pet habitat" shop would it?

Anyway, yeah, that girl's definitely in premolt. you made the right choice of moving her out of there. If it's anything like the one near mine, she would have molted out into a bunch of mites, cricket babies, and mold. Hope she'll molt out beautiful for ya real soon!

And you must take pictures of it when it happens. It's what we do around here.:p
 

arachnoobie

Arachnopeon
Joined
Nov 23, 2009
Messages
33
yehhh sorry about the handling photo i couldnt get the stubborn guy in his new terra.
and hobo thats amazing it was at pet habitat at metro town!! i felt god awefull its prob the other avic he was sooo sadddd im so glad ur out there helping save the buggers and yes swampy is how i would describe the substrate
 
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StephanieH

Arachnosquire
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Nov 1, 2009
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53
Sounds like the same setup I got my avic from. Only I'm in Indiana. She hasn't molted yet, but I think she is very happy now. Good job!!
 

Hobo

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yehhh sorry about the handling photo i couldnt get the stubborn guy in his new terra.
and hobo thats amazing it was at pet habitat at metro town!! i felt god awefull its prob the other avic he was sooo sadddd im so glad ur out there helping save the buggers and yes swampy is how i would describe the substrate
Hahah.. yup that's the exact same store. Well, if it was the only avic left, then you got the "good" one. Trust me, you didn't want to see how bad the other one was! That particular pet store is terrible at keeping spiders (take a look at this post I made about a T. blondi there), which is odd since the same chain branch at richmond center takes relatively good care of em (Well the guy there actually keeps spiders himself, so that might account for the difference).

Also, I had a mall gift card and used it to get a B. smithi there (they had 2), and just in case you are wanting to get the one they have left, I'm pretty sure it's a male when I checked (I, of course, got the female!).
But even with a gift card, I don't think I'll be getting anymore spiders from them. They're terrible, and chances are they're just going to replace them and treat em all the same way.

Anyway, glad to hear that last avic they had found a good home!
 

arachnoobie

Arachnopeon
Joined
Nov 23, 2009
Messages
33
quick update- my avic or "wasabi" has molted successfully and started eating and he eats like an animal even with dead prey he likes to jump at it,, pix as soon as i find my camera charger:clap:
 

shanebp

Arachnobaron
Old Timer
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Dec 14, 2009
Messages
353
Sounds good! My avic does the same, whenever I put food in, it kinda freaks out and launches itself at the prey (in my case dead crickets). Pretty cool behavior if you ask me.
 
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