Euathlus sp Red sling care

MrDave · Feb 24, 2015

There's a reptile expo near by this weekend and my favourite breeder/seller is attending. I am toying with the idea of getting one or two 1/6 inch Euathlus sp. red slings. (My LPs are out growing their small enclosures).

I've done some searching on this board, but not found too much info regarding feeding such tiny Euathlus slings. Pinhead crickets will be hard for me to acquire, so I'm wondering if these guys would eat the legs of the larger crickets I feed to my bigger T's. Chopped up crickets work? Both of these worked well with my LPs. Do I need to pick up fruit flies at the expo as well?

Plans aren't firm - I may not even be able to escape the house on Sunday. But if nothing else, this expo seems to happen every 2nd month or so.

Thanks,
Dave

Sam_Peanuts · Feb 24, 2015

Feeding them cricket legs will absolutely work, that's what I did with my tiny(1/8") C. perezmilesi sling and it worked great.

louise f · Feb 24, 2015

MrDave said:
There's a reptile expo near by this weekend and my favourite breeder/seller is attending. I am toying with the idea of getting one or two 1/6 inch Euathlus sp. red slings. (My LPs are out growing their small enclosures).

I've done some searching on this board, but not found too much info regarding feeding such tiny Euathlus slings. Pinhead crickets will be hard for me to acquire, so I'm wondering if these guys would eat the legs of the larger crickets I feed to my bigger T's. Chopped up crickets work? Both of these worked well with my LPs. Do I need to pick up fruit flies at the expo as well?

Plans aren't firm - I may not even be able to escape the house on Sunday. But if nothing else, this expo seems to happen every 2nd month or so.

Thanks,
Dave

You can use fruit flies as well, but just as a snack.

just1moreT · Feb 24, 2015

I have a couple Hapalopus triseriatus there very small as well ,I have a growing colony of meal worms,I really didn't realize how small a meal worm starts out tiny tiny.they put up a fight. but the little H triseriatus can take them

MrDave · Feb 24, 2015

louise f said:
You can use fruit flies as well, but just as a snack.

I've read that some believe they aren't very good as a main diet, but I wasn't sure this particular species would be OK with dead crickets or cricket parts. And FFF are the only live option I could think of - roaches aren't an option in Canada (legally). I had some fruit flies which I fed to my A versi for a while, until it grew big enough to take the crickets I had available. Probably had 500 flies at any particular time and maybe... a dozen actually were fed to my spider. I'll avoid them if I can.

Also: WOOT. Arachnosquire status acquired!

just1moreT · Feb 24, 2015

I have 4 tiny E sp red going on 2 years now I'm just starting see some color in 2 of them lol and there all still under a inch .I used pin head crickets and little bigger ones when I was feeding mine , but a person has to have the crickets on hand to do that ,you will enjoy them just don't get in hurry lol

Sam_Peanuts · Feb 24, 2015

I haven't encountered a sling that wasn't fine with dead cricket parts yet.

And if you're unlucky enough to find one that won't take a dead prey, all you have to do is put a small container of soaking wet dirt in you adults cricket enclosure, keep it above 75F(85F for best/faster results) and you'll have pinheads in 2-3 weeks.

MrDave · Feb 24, 2015

Sam_Peanuts said:
I haven't encountered a sling that wasn't fine with dead cricket parts yet.

And if you're unlucky enough to find one that won't take a dead prey, all you have to do is put a small container of soaking wet dirt in you adults cricket enclosure, keep it above 75F(85F for best/faster results) and you'll have pinheads in 2-3 weeks.

I've been trying this actually. Not much luck with the 75F part, though and 3 weeks hasn't really passed yet since I set this up. Will go find a heating pad of some sort and get this going. New slings or not, I'd be happy not to be buying crickets anymore.

---------- Post added 02-24-2015 at 12:09 PM ----------

just1moreT said:
I have 4 tiny E sp red going on 2 years now I'm just starting see some color in 2 of them lol and there all still under a inch .I used pin head crickets and little bigger ones when I was feeding mine , but a person has to have the crickets on hand to do that ,you will enjoy them just don't get in hurry lol

2 years to get to not even 1 inch! Wow. Guess these guys won't be mentioned on that 'fastest growing' thread from the other day.

Drache · Feb 24, 2015

Mine are 1/4" and are taking 1st instar dubias with the heads removed quite eagerly.

gobey · Feb 24, 2015

Oy that's why I want to buy an AF lol.

What a LONG time to raise a sling.

goodoldneon · Feb 24, 2015

Flightless fruit flies are perfectly acceptable. I could be wrong, but I doubt cricket legs are all that common in the wild. A sling that size would, by necessity, take down and/or scavenge any and all available food items. Countless slings have been reared on fff, none the worse for the wear.

Austin S. · Feb 24, 2015

I feed my 2nd instar's FFF's. Not as a main diet though. I purchase pinhead crickets, crush the heads, and chop them up into three pieces, and drop it right infront of the sling, they take it everytime. Can be very time consuming doing so, but it works well.

Sam_Peanuts · Feb 24, 2015

MrDave said:
I've been trying this actually. Not much luck with the 75F part, though and 3 weeks hasn't really passed yet since I set this up. Will go find a heating pad of some sort and get this going. New slings or not, I'd be happy not to be buying crickets anymore.

I guess I've been lucky, I did it twice and it worked both time. I leave it 1 week with the adults and then remove it.

Once I put a lid(with tiny holes) on the container(and checked it twice a day to see if they hatched) and put it on my router(a rackmount one which is basically a computer, don't try this if you're going to be blocking ventilation to the thing) where it got at exactly 85F(which was the recommended temperature I found on this forum, I was really lucky) and the second time I just let it open in another container at room temp(around 75F with two or three 3-4 hour 78F peeks during the week) not expecting it to work and they also hatched.

MrDave · Feb 24, 2015

Sam_Peanuts said:
I guess I've been lucky, I did it twice and it worked both time. I leave it 1 week with the adults and then remove it.

Once I put a lid(with tiny holes) on the container(and checked it twice a day to see if they hatched) and put it on my router(a rackmount one which is basically a computer, don't try this if you're going to be blocking ventilation to the thing) where it got at exactly 85F(which was the recommended temperature I found on this forum, I was really lucky) and the second time I just let it open in another container at room temp(around 75F with two or three 3-4 hour 78F peeks during the week) not expecting it to work and they also hatched.

Laying it on top of my computer is a great idea, and kinda obvious - should have thought of that. Its a desktop that puts out a fair amount of heat and is on almost all the time.

miss moxie · Feb 24, 2015

I've got two slings, both .25" and I just cut crickets up with scissors and give them the pieces. Haven't had any issues, and they've always got big fat abdomens.

Sana · Feb 25, 2015

Does anyone recall reading a discussion on a thread a while back about slings eating some of a cricket but leaving enough that you can't tell they are eating?

Drache · Feb 25, 2015

Sana said:
Does anyone recall reading a discussion on a thread a while back about slings eating some of a cricket but leaving enough that you can't tell they are eating?

That is something I wondered about, although that thread must have been before I joined.
It seems to me that sometimes whatever pre-killed item I left for them has bits missing or has dried up, unlike an entirely uneaten item.

Sana · Feb 25, 2015

Drache said:
That is something I wondered about, although that thread must have been before I joined.
It seems to me that sometimes whatever pre-killed item I left for them has bits missing or has dried up, unlike an entirely uneaten item.

I had gotten to wondering as I've been feeding prekilled to my smallest slings and I seem to look in the next day and find cricket remains in most of their containers. I can't decide if it's possible that they are eating some of it or if they are in premolt and refusing food. Kind of wish I knew which is was, but as all are alive and well, and look healthy when they peek out of their little burrows, I'm trying to leave them do whatever spider things they are doing. Last thing that they need is a flipped out, worried, over caring keeper.

Storm76 · Feb 26, 2015

MrDave said:
Laying it on top of my computer is a great idea, and kinda obvious - should have thought of that. Its a desktop that puts out a fair amount of heat and is on almost all the time.

Not really - constant vibration = bad for a spider!

Sam_Peanuts · Feb 27, 2015

Storm76 said:
Not really - constant vibration = bad for a spider!

Except that part was about incubating cricket eggs, not the spider.

Euathlus sp Red sling care

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