Safe spiders to Feed T's ?

[mimic58]

I was reading up an found that one of the best things to feed T's is other spiders....

This sounded great as theres hundreds arround here what id like to know is what ones are safe to give it , Iv seen that some small common spiders are Extreamly venomous and could actualy kill the T's first.

Anyone know more??

[Lochala]

I don't think that is a very wise idea. Just stick with lobster roaches, crickets, mealworms, and the other more commonly raised bugs for captive spiders.

[metzgerzoo]

Sure, get spiders that are defanged and have no venom.
Seriously though, IMO it's not a good or wise idea to feed other spiders to tarantulas. While a small spider might not be able to kill an adult tarantula, that does not mean it can't hurt it or cause it enough injury that the T ends up dying. Plus, house spiders can and will kill slings. Why would you want to feed spiders to your Ts anyway?

I agree with Lochala, stick to normal, SAFE feeders

[mimic58]

It says in many books and on many websites that one of the main natural prey items of many tarantulas is "smaller spiders" ,

so I figured id try to find out more ,I dont fancy finding out the hard way wich ones it can and cant eat safely

[Sterlingspider]

One of the main problems withthis approach is that most native spiders have been exposed to many different kinds of pestacides and over the generations have developed immunities to (and baseline "blood" levels of) certain poisons.

Your tarantulas have not.

A live caught insect/spider is more like a RAID shake then a tasty snack. And just because you dont spray your lawn does not mean the Smiths down the block do the same.

The best bet is to stick with feeder animals that have been raised and bred in controlled environments and do not pose any threat to your pets.

Besides that, many animals will eat things in nature out of convenience that they would not if given a choice of other food. Just because somthing makes up a large part of the natural diet of a creature doesnt mean its good for it. Hence why we dont feed live mice, birds, and half rotted meat to our housecats.