Therphosa blondi breeding attempt

Theraphosa blondi breeding attempt

Here are some pictures of a recent attempt at breeding Theraphosa blondi . Both specimens are fairly recent imports. The female is mine and the male belongs to my sister, who is known as LCP here on the AB. She also took the pictures, which came out pretty good considering the dim light conditions the event took place in. The shot of the male's pediplap is especially impressive!

Both spiders are about the same body size, but the male has an incredible leg span. In a hunched position, it's 8-9" easy. I supect if his legs were fully extended he'd exceed ten or eleven.

Wade

Pic of male

Although the body size of the two spiders is about the same, the male's legspan in amazing. Probably the largest spider I've ever worked with, he dwarfs the last mature T. blondi male I had. 8-9" easy in a relatively curled resting position, I suspect he may exceed 11" when fully extended.

Here he is on my gloved hands. Gloves are for protection against urticating hair and would do nothing to stop the 3/4" fangs!

Wade

Great pics!

That's a monster! It's still hard to gauge size correctly from a pic, but that guy looks huge, and I can only imagine how impressive he is in person. I hope she has a big sac for you.

That is quite a specimen! Good luck

Wade said:

Although the body size of the two spiders is about the same, the male's legspan in amazing. Probably the largest spider I've ever worked with, he dwarfs the last mature T. blondi male I had. 8-9" easy in a relatively curled resting position, I suspect he may exceed 11" when fully extended.

Here he is on my gloved hands. Gloves are for protection against urticating hair and would do nothing to stop the 3/4" fangs!

Wade

Click to expand...

Those are some funky looking gloves. But very nice tarantulas you have there good luck on the breeding.

Nice pics and T's! How big is your female?

What a T....Nice one and huge...i hope mine will grow till that size...goodluck

Aaron

Good luck Wade! We really need more people in the hobby to have success with these beasts.

Oh, and that male is need of a picture with ruler!

The same day those other pics were taken, we did try to get some with a ruler. I don't have a digital camera myself, so my sister takes the pictures when she's over!

Here's the best one. If we try again, a non-shiny ruler would probably work better Because the spider is in the foreground, this is not the most accurate picture. Nonetheless, I'd say it gives a good indication of the size we're talking about.

The female is about the same body size with a more rotund abdomen, but with shorter legs. It's funny, when they're in their respective cages, he looks much bigger than her, but when she's looming over him during breeding it looks alot different!

The gloves are made for use by commercial fishermen, I found them at a fishing supply store. Dish gloves work well for this sort of thing, but they do not fit on my largish hands.


Wade

Yeah, we definately need to take some more ruler shots. He is absolutely HUGE. (The female isn't exactly tiny herself!)

Here's a closer look at that embolus...

Lindsey

thats a HUGE blondi :drool:

t. blondi

i really would like one of these soon..ne ideas on where i can get one..in the US??

is it even possible to get it in the US?

Very nice pictures...

My male T. blondi just had his ultimate molt about 4 weeks ago and my female T. blondi molted about 2 months ago. My females an easy 7 inches and my male is around 9 inches.

I do have a question for you Wade. Did you "shark tank" (separate by a screen) the male and the female for a couple of days before introducing them or did you just throw them in together the same day? Also, usually when I throw in a couple of T's together to mate they usually start drumming right away. I haven't seen any signs of drumming from either. I've had my pair separated by a screen for about two days now and will be removing the screen sometime this weekend. What would you or anyone else's suggesstion be as to the proper way (I don't want my male to be eaten) to introduce two blondi's together. Because of their destructive size I don't want anyone getting hurt. I also noticed that you had a brush in the pictures, was that to separate them just in case one of them attempted to execute the other one? Thanks for any input.

I cant imagine my blondi being that size...congrat for the mating and good luck for the big egg sac....im sure you gone update us when such thing happens!!!

Aaron

I didn't shark tank them, but the male has been residing in a container that rests on top of the female's. I don't doubt that they're aware of each other.

I let the male wander into the females cage, but I don't generally just drop him in. I just coax him to walk towards her cage, but once he's put his foot in there I step back and let him take over. Normally, once he touches the substrate in her cage, he'll just freeze, often for 20 minutes or so. Then, he slowly moves into position. The first pairing, he did drum briefly, but it was quiet and if we hadn't be stairing intently at him we would have missed it. I haven't seem him do it since (they've been together 4 times now). Then there's that moment when they rush together and you're not sure if they're going to mate or fight! Then, she relaxes and he lifts her and does his thing. Due to the dim light, I'm not sure if hes getting his palps in every time, but I don't want to risk disturbing them with a flashlight. However, he does make a new sperm web a day or so after every pairing, so I'm hoping he's getting it done!

Yes, the brush is a wrangling tool. I like a brush, an angry spider could chomp on the bristles all day and not chip a fang. In some pictures, I'm actually using the handle in the third pic to insert between them because it's narrow and less obtrusive. This was a "just in case" thing, she has not made a serious attempt at eating him yet. The round end of a metal barbeque skewer can also be useful, as it can be looped around the females chelicerae.

Wade