G. rosea sling stuck in moult

One of my rosie slings is partially stuck in it's moulted skin. This is the only sling out of over 300 that had a deformed leg once it moulted into second instar. I assumed this would be corrected on the next moult or two. Well it moulted into 3rd instar and now the entire shed skin seems to be stuck on the deformed leg. It looks like the leg is still screwed up but it is hard to tell with the whole shed stuck there.

Should I just rip it off and hope the little guy survives and regrows the limb? Or should I leave it alone and let it drag it's whole exhuvium (spelling?) around for the next couple of months?

Should I just rip it off and hope the little guy survives and regrows the limb?

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NO!

Try a wet cotton swab on the leg.
The molt should come off on its own.

kosh said:

Should I just rip it off and hope the little guy survives and regrows the limb? Or should I leave it alone and let it drag it's whole exhuvium (spelling?) around for the next couple of months?

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I would give it a couple of days to see if it autotomises the limb on its own (or if the exuvium comes off) but if it doesn't my suggestion would be to induce autotomy of the limb. You could just cut the exuvium off below the living leg but my feeling is that if it nearly got stuck the last time and the sling wound up with a gimp leg and then followed that up by getting even more stuck on this moult, the next moult is going to be the same.

As for 'ripping it off', I hope that was hyperbole. All you need to do is gently restrain the sling with something like a Q-tip or finger pressure on the carapace while pulling and slightly twisting the offending leg with a pair of tweezers or forceps. It should come clean off and the loss of one limb won't appreciably hurt the sling.

i agree with codemonkey. if u see that it dosen't drop its leg though and its been a while then id pull it off

mike