LythSalicaria
Arachnosquire
- Joined
- Jun 4, 2014
- Messages
- 122
A while ago I posted about receiving a mature male G. porteri from a fellow keeper I helped when he was starting out. Tonight I finally worked up the courage to pair that male with my psychotic mature female G. porteri, "Ginger". I am incredibly happy to report that the pairing couldn't have gone better! :biggrin:
At 8:50 I corralled the male in a 16 oz. deli cup that was well-ventilated. At 8:54 he was placed in the female's enclosure, deli cup and all and I observed them quietly for nearly two hours. Both the male and female showed increasingly frantic signs of interest, but no noticeable aggression. At approximately 10:45 I set the shark tank containing the male in one of the corners on the opposite side of the aquarium from the female. For nearly 10 minutes he just sat there, but then suddenly he started crawling out, cautiously crab-walking toward the female and tapping frantically the instant his front feet touched substrate. The female kept her back to him as he approached and seemed to be completely ignoring him. As soon as he touched one of her legs she lunged at him and I feared the worst, but the male was, as I expected from his size, easily able to hook her fangs and hold her in position while he achieved multiple insertions. He was strong enough to bull-doze her into one of the corners of her enclosure and even nearly managed to force her on to her back near the end of the process. At the point that he pushed her on her back I could see that he was no longer trying to make insertions, so I put a large paintbrush between the two of them and got the male back into his shark tank. He was returned to his permanent enclosure shortly after I worked the manic glee out of my system (approximately 10 minutes after the pairing).
Not only did the pairing go well, I even managed to get great video footage of it with a friend's phone. I'll be uploading it to YouTube as soon as I figure out how to get the video file from the phone to my computer.
I just had to share the joy with those of you who have helped me get to this point. This is a humble start, but for me it's a milestone.
Here's hoping I get a good sac out of this.
While I know I have said this before, thank you all so much for your advice, your friendship, your humor, your scoldings and everything in between.
And the best part is, this is still only the beginning. :love:
At 8:50 I corralled the male in a 16 oz. deli cup that was well-ventilated. At 8:54 he was placed in the female's enclosure, deli cup and all and I observed them quietly for nearly two hours. Both the male and female showed increasingly frantic signs of interest, but no noticeable aggression. At approximately 10:45 I set the shark tank containing the male in one of the corners on the opposite side of the aquarium from the female. For nearly 10 minutes he just sat there, but then suddenly he started crawling out, cautiously crab-walking toward the female and tapping frantically the instant his front feet touched substrate. The female kept her back to him as he approached and seemed to be completely ignoring him. As soon as he touched one of her legs she lunged at him and I feared the worst, but the male was, as I expected from his size, easily able to hook her fangs and hold her in position while he achieved multiple insertions. He was strong enough to bull-doze her into one of the corners of her enclosure and even nearly managed to force her on to her back near the end of the process. At the point that he pushed her on her back I could see that he was no longer trying to make insertions, so I put a large paintbrush between the two of them and got the male back into his shark tank. He was returned to his permanent enclosure shortly after I worked the manic glee out of my system (approximately 10 minutes after the pairing).
Not only did the pairing go well, I even managed to get great video footage of it with a friend's phone. I'll be uploading it to YouTube as soon as I figure out how to get the video file from the phone to my computer.
I just had to share the joy with those of you who have helped me get to this point. This is a humble start, but for me it's a milestone.
Here's hoping I get a good sac out of this.While I know I have said this before, thank you all so much for your advice, your friendship, your humor, your scoldings and everything in between.
And the best part is, this is still only the beginning. :love:
