Hey guys, I recently received an A. antillensis sling and it is already a little burrow machine. I rarely see him except at night sometimes. When I feed him crickets he drags them into his burrow, How do you guys clean the bolus' out of the cage? I don't want to go digging thru the sub tearing up his burrow. Also, I have yet to find a bolus in my G. rosea's enclosure, Could she possibly just be devouring the whole cricket?
How do you clean your burrowers enclosures?
- Thread starter justynh
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They generally flick the bolus out of the burrow, which makes easy clean up...same for molted exoskeletons. They're naturally pretty clean and like to keep their burrows free from debris. Definitely don't go digging up a burrow. There isn't always much of a bolus, other times they will bury or hide them. My experiences is that they tend to either flick them out of a borrow (my psalmos do this) or choose a place....corner, water dish, etc. It shouldn't be anything you need to concern yourself with.
---------- Post added 08-23-2014 at 05:17 PM ----------
Just worry about the ones you can see and get to.
---------- Post added 08-23-2014 at 05:17 PM ----------
Just worry about the ones you can see and get to.
sezra
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You must have well behaved kids! my OBT is going through the difficult teenage years because she is disgusting!They generally flick the bolus out of the burrow, which makes easy clean up...same for molted exoskeletons. They're naturally pretty clean and like to keep their burrows free from debris. Definitely don't go digging up a burrow. There isn't always much of a bolus, other times they will bury or hide them. My experiences is that they tend to either flick them out of a borrow (my psalmos do this) or choose a place....corner, water dish, etc. It shouldn't be anything you need to concern yourself with.
she spends 90% of her time in her burrow, and NEVER removes poop and dead crix. I have to dig her out every few months to remove all the crap she has hoarded! Its gross, but I still love her.
The last time I cleaned her out, I found 2 molts, countless dead crix and a store room of poop. Would she give it up? hell no!
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There's always a few oddballs...sounds nasty....Mine will at times leave junk in there, but eventually they do a house cleaning....your obt is dirty...name it after a porn star
sezra
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Haha, I should have done, but her name is quelaag. after the spider boss in the darksouls gameThere's always a few oddballs...sounds nasty....Mine will at times leave junk in there, but eventually they do a house cleaning....your obt is dirty...name it after a porn star
pyro fiend
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yea not all kick it out i dont have any burrowers and iv noticed my rosea sometimes burried a bolbus [wtf??] so maybe thats why you cant find your rosies? mines a 4"+ and has burried them a few times against the glass.. its kinda gross.. like a sick squirrel minded tarantula =\
One of my L.ps likes to web it's molts into the walls of its burrow. It also recently grabbed the bottle cap water dish when I was taking it out to clean it and took it down in the burrow and I can't get it back unless I dig it up. It's on the top of the list to be rehoused after I get myself rehoused next week. I will get the dish back, just you wait and see!
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ya'll have got some packrat spiders ! LOL
freedumbdclxvi
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I have spiders like that, and I never go tearing up their burrows to get stuff out. There is no need to do so, especially spiders that like bone dry conditions like OBTs.
Peter Parker
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Buy isopods and dump them in for your high humidity species. Dont go ripping it apart unless you absolutly have to. The things we drop or move around in there tanks bother us more then them. Its a bug not a dog. It has no idea what a bottle cap is that fell at the top of there burrow. You might hurt it prying up the substrate but more than likely your going to aggrevate it and its going to want to bite you or flee and if it's a cobalt blue you might be chasing that thing around like a retard. For food try to feed them roaches as roaches can stay in the tank without harm, I have not a problem with them. If it bothers you them being in the tank.for too long. Best time to pull them out is during the molt. Try not to disturb. It's common that you will think that the animal is dead. 99 times out of 100 it's not. You will smell a bad odor if the animal dies. I like Micheal Jacobi s idea of the soda bottle. If I want to move that animal safely and quickly I use the soda bottle method.
Medusa
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My OBT is my "trailer trash" spider. She has filled a large tornado-style web several inches high filled with substrate, boluses, exuvium(?), etc., and there are tunnels throughout. It's quite fascinating. And she can fly through the entire maze in a nanosecond!
Peter Parker
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Sorry didn't even main topic but it all applies for the future. Feed the sling cricket legs not whole crickets. Less waste and chance of the cricket biting. If it can eat whole crickets if the cricket is female rip the black tail out of its bum and crush it's jaw with your tongs. If you must get it out prod the sub rate with a paint brush. It will come up. If it's in a pill bottle. Put the bottle inside a critter keeper and prod it out and once it's in the CK. Cap it off and pull out the pill bottle. Put in next size up pill bottle and use your pain brush to coax it in to that bottle. Cap it off. This way is slow but you should not get bit.
---------- Post added 08-24-2014 at 11:27 AM ----------
For the OBT. Use water. Too much water will destroy webbing exposing bug.
---------- Post added 08-24-2014 at 11:27 AM ----------
For the OBT. Use water. Too much water will destroy webbing exposing bug.
freedumbdclxvi
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Why are you suggesting using water with an OBT? Leave the spider alone unless you are rehousing.
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For the most part, I don't. Some of my trash hoarders occasionally do 'spring cleaning' and drag stuff out of their labyrinths, usually before a molt. Others just web them off in antechambers and leave them there. My AF OBT molted this past spring. I hadn't seen an exuvium from her in a couple of years. About a month prior to her molt she went on a cleaning frenzy. She completely redid her web chambers and openings, tossed out pieces and parts of multiple exuvia as well as a stash of boluses.