Fangless Pumpkin Patch- HELP Please

viper69 · Nov 25, 2014

Well my young adult female Hap sp Columbia Large (aka Pumpkin Patch) has been a joy. Until her recent molt 2 weeks ago. She last molted a year ago. I've had her since she was a TINY sling when this locality was fairly new in the hobby.

There's never been a problem with her. Well, for some unknown reason she had a difficult molt in that she's missing fangs. I've attached 3 pictures. The front view is a bit blurry but you can see she's missing fangs. I know she's hungry as she's readily tried to capture crickets- see pics. I gave her small crickets, soft bodied too, and she cannot eat. She can grab one, but it's a struggle for her to keep hold of one (NOT NORMAL for this locality or her), and eventually she lets the cricket go. She can definitely drink, I've seen her do it twice since molting.

SO, what do I do? I've read on the board that some people make a cricket soup, mashing up crickets. What I don't know is how do they attract their fangless T to the mashed up crickets??? I was going to mash some up and put them in a small water cap. Is that the best I can do? Anyone with experience on this one?? Or is she doomed to die of starvation or rather I'd put her to "sleep"

Aside from being fangless, she's behaving normally, walking/crawling etc. Her chelicerae are a pinkish/white bone color currently, definitely not the color they look normally. She is able to move them normally from what I observed.

What would prevent fangs from growing in?

Oumriel · Nov 25, 2014

How incredibly bizarre, I definitely would try mashing or slicing open a cricket body (no legs) and see if she will take that. Because the cricket is dead and mashed, it's going to get rancid pretty quickly. I would probably give her a new cap of crix mash at least daily in till you notice her eating. Also if she does eat it, if she were mine, I would make sure she was warm to try to stimulate more appetite and try and push the next molt ahead of schedule. Don't euthanize her, give her a chance to pull through as long as you can meet her needs right now.

14pokies · Nov 25, 2014

Oumriel said:
How incredibly bizarre, I definitely would try mashing or slicing open a cricket body (no legs) and see if she will take that. Because the cricket is dead and mashed, it's going to get rancid pretty quickly. I would probably give her a new cap of crix mash at least daily in till you notice her eating. Also if she does eat it, if she were mine, I would make sure she was warm to try to stimulate more appetite and try and push the next molt ahead of schedule. Don't euthanize her, give her a chance to pull through as long as you can meet her needs right now.[/QUOTE +1

jigalojey · Nov 25, 2014

Horrible molt, those chelicerae are ridiculously damaged, mashed crickets are the only way to go.

Jack III · Nov 25, 2014

What does the molted exoskeleton look like? Does it appear normal?

macbaffo · Nov 25, 2014

A hungry T will normally go hunting. Just give it at evening and remove it in the morning. I haven't tried to give mashed cricket or worm to a fangless T but I did with little slings. If they eat I' m positive (and hopeful) yours will too.

ARACHNO-SMACK48 · Nov 25, 2014

Don't just mash the crickets up..there will be too many hard pieces of the exoskeleton in the mush. Instead cut the crickets head off then cut out/ squeeze out its internals. Its like a cricket smoothy.

cold blood · Nov 25, 2014

Might be even easier to cut the head off a superworm and squeeze out the innards.

Good luck viper! I'd bet it will pull through.

Was it a bad molt or did the spider somehow snap them off on something?

Beary Strange · Nov 25, 2014

The soup I made for my little ones I've offered it either on a tiny plastic leaf, like a platter or in a bowl--both worked fine. I imagine it's to do with the scavenging instinct. But like cold blood, I'd suggest mealies over crickets--there's more goop inside. Or even just go with his method; if it's already dead, she might be able to hold onto it better.

viper69 · Nov 25, 2014

Thanks everyone!

Jack III said:
What does the molted exoskeleton look like? Does it appear normal?

Saved it, hadn't had a chance to look detailed, too focused on the living. Will look over the holiday. It appears normal.

macbaffo said:
A hungry T will normally go hunting. Just give it at evening and remove it in the morning. I haven't tried to give mashed cricket or worm to a fangless T but I did with little slings. If they eat I' m positive (and hopeful) yours will too.

Thanks, good point.

ARACHNO-SMACK48 said:
Don't just mash the crickets up..there will be too many hard pieces of the exoskeleton in the mush. Instead cut the crickets head off then cut out/ squeeze out its internals. Its like a cricket smoothy.

Good point..hadn't considered that!

cold blood said:
Might be even easier to cut the head off a superworm and squeeze out the innards.

Good luck viper! I'd bet it will pull through.

Was it a bad molt or did the spider somehow snap them off on something?

Was wondering the same. I checked the web mat floor, and from what I can see I didn't notice any fangs. I'm going to check the molt and see if the new fangs are inside, though I doubt it. The old fangs look normal after the molt. She also had some odd ventral issue on her abdomen right below her slit around the posterior lungs actually, looked like a portion of her insides was pushing through to be honest. It was a bit crater shaped, like the moon. I honestly don't know if that's what was going on, it only looked that way. Nothing was dragging. It just wasn't formed correctly. The tissue was shiny, indicating it was wet. I've never seen that before either in a T. She drank quite a bit, and the ventral portion dried up and appears healed, though it's not perfectly shaped as it should be. It's odd because she was fine this entire year, she rarely ate, which given her size wasn't unusual. I'll try 2 methods

1. Give her a slit open cricket and see if that works, using tongs
2. The soup method that everyone has suggested.

It's like her entire chelicerae just stopped growing internally. It's not just fangs missing, but they are not colored normally and obviously rough looking too. It's all weird to me. I would have expected fangs off, but the rest normal or close to normal.

I'd hate to lose her.

Biollantefan54 · Nov 25, 2014

My G. porteri molted and is missing one fang, it is broken at about 1/5 of the way from the chelicerae. I know it didn't break it, I was there when it molted, I saw its fang come out like that. Its molt was perfectly fine, it just didn't look like the fang formed all the way. My G. porteri has always been a picky eater but I could tell it was hungry, it would stand over food and pounce at it but would never fully attack. I have a male in its cage, they have been together for a month or two now and I fed the male a male dubia roach. He ate some of it, put it down and the female came and picked it up.

catfishrod69 · Nov 25, 2014

Incase anyone else might need to use this thread. http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?215761-bad-day&highlight=urticans+fangs

viper69 · Nov 25, 2014

catfishrod69 said:
Incase anyone else might need to use this thread. http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?215761-bad-day&highlight=urticans+fangs

Thanks Catfish for this. What a beautiful T, she still alive? Man, after reading that, I'm a bit more hopeful now. I know she's hungry so I'm going to get some superworms (she's never had those) and crickets, and see if I can make some insect paste by squishing their guts out. I'm also going to try Stan's idea first which is to cut the head off, and slice down the length of the cricket. I MIGHT be able to get away w/that. We'll see. Too bad this species this is so skittish and a hair flicker, at least mine is. Thank god they are tough as nails though! We'll see!

Ultum4Spiderz · Nov 25, 2014

Good luck, I never seen anything this bad except my Goliath cyst.

catfishrod69 · Nov 26, 2014

Unfortunately my female passed away about a year ago or so. Yeah that might work as well. Just be sure to open it up to where she can suck the inside juices. It should work. She still looks pretty plump, so you are lucky. Hopefully she pulls through this and makes it ok bro.

viper69 said:
Thanks Catfish for this. What a beautiful T, she still alive? Man, after reading that, I'm a bit more hopeful now. I know she's hungry so I'm going to get some superworms (she's never had those) and crickets, and see if I can make some insect paste by squishing their guts out. I'm also going to try Stan's idea first which is to cut the head off, and slice down the length of the cricket. I MIGHT be able to get away w/that. We'll see. Too bad this species this is so skittish and a hair flicker, at least mine is. Thank god they are tough as nails though! We'll see!

Disquiet · Nov 26, 2014

Good luck, man! Rooting for you and your girl!

viper69 · Nov 26, 2014

Well today is day one. I have two fat crickets, cut off their legs and heads, oozed a 3rd one over the other two. The fat ones I cut down the length of the cricket. I put them in a shallow water cap, more shallow than what she drinks out of. And what thanks do I get? Two flicks from her mirror patch! She hasn't gone for them yet. I tried moving them around, adding water droplets along her web mat to mimic movement, same w/the crickets. Finally had to move her so at least her legs were touching the crickets. I think she's just scared of the dish as it's "new". I'm not encouraged so far. This sucks because a few nights ago she would take a cricket out of my tongs.

bryverine · Nov 30, 2016

@viper69 may I ask how this turned out?

I just noticed my P. muticus looks like it's missing a whole chelicerae.

Here's a picture of her. You can actually see the inner surface of her right chelicerae.

(Sorry about the blow out, it wasnt very bright in the enclosure)
Last molt: 8/17/16
Post molt feed date: 10/22/16
Feeder: 1 large (very fat) adult female dubia.

It appeared as though she ate it though I haven't found any trace of the dubia. Then again she hasn't ever really left boluses out either.

The molt had been shredded/destroyed so there's no use looking there.

I've scoured the enclosure as much as I can (you know, with most of her home underground and only having peek-a-boo flaps to see things) and haven't found any 'parts'.

I cannot tell if she indeed lost the whole area or not because of lighting (I dont want to upset her too much) and her being scrunched up.

I'm fairly worried but she's also looking more plump than after her molt.

Venom1080 · Nov 30, 2016

bryverine said:
@viper69 may I ask how this turned out?

I just noticed my P. muticus looks like it's missing a whole chelicerae.

Here's a picture of her. You can actually see the inner surface of her left chelicerae.
View attachment 225851
(Sorry about the blow out, it wasnt very bright in the enclosure)
Last molt: 8/17/16
Post molt feed date: 10/22/16
Feeder: 1 large (very fat) adult female dubia.

It appeared as though she ate it though I haven't found any trace of the dubia. Then again she hasn't ever really left boluses out either.

The molt had been shredded/destroyed so there's no use looking there.

I've scoured the enclosure as much as I can (you know, with most of her home underground and only having peek-a-boo flaps to see things) and haven't found any 'parts'.

I cannot tell if she indeed lost the whole area or not because of lighting (I dont want to upset her too much) and her being scrunched up.

I'm fairly worried but she's also looking more plump than after her molt.

as long as it has one fully functional fang it should be okay. full water dish and maybe easier to take down meals is what she needs.

cold blood · Nov 30, 2016

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cold blood
Nov 20, 2016
2

P. cancerides 3.5"

This particular P. cancerides has lost both fangs on 2 separate occasions, and one 3 different times. He was snapping them off on the ventilation.

Wax worms are a fangless ts best friend.

Fangless Pumpkin Patch- HELP Please

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