Mary Allen
They are actually quite harmless, but their eight legs and hairy body make tarantulas a nightmare for many people. For others, the animals are fascinating.
A hairy body, eight long, nimble legs, and two sharp fangs that flash when the animal rears to attack. Anyone who gets a shiver down their spine from this description could be among the estimated ten percent of people who suffer from fear of spiders, i.e. arachnophobia. Like most modern fears that plague our everyday lives, arachnophobia is a terror that is almost entirely unfounded. Even most spider phobics know that, with a few exceptions, the animals are actually quite harmless to humans. Many, despite their fear, are still fascinated by the eight-legged creatures.
The huge tarantulas in particular have impressed people. The strangeness and their unpredictable hunting behavior make viewers stop in front of spider terrariums and quickly realize that these animals have their very own charm. The more one deals with the creatures, the more the fears towards them are weakened. Children and young people, in particular, can develop a healthy relationship with small animals through early contact with tarantulas.
Don’t Catch Food Yourself
In addition, keeping tarantulas in terrariums is relatively easy. “Tarantulas don’t need to be fed very often,” says Roland Zobel from the Fördergemeinschaft Leben mit Heimtiere e.V. (FLH). “Depending on the species and age of the spider, one or two feedings a month are sufficient. You can tell whether she has eaten enough by looking at the ratio between her abdomen and her front body. If the back part is the same size like up to one and a half times the size of the front part, the spider is optimally nourished.»
Tarantulas are excellent hunters and can in principle eat anything living that corresponds to their size. In the wild, mice and young birds are sometimes on their menu. In the terrarium, however, the food should be limited to protein-rich insects such as crickets, grasshoppers, and cockroaches. “Please never use animals you have caught yourself to feed pets, as you never know where they were before and what they ate. There is a large selection of suitable and specially bred feed animals in pet shops,” recommends Zobel.
Tarantulas Like to Hide
Not all tarantulas are the same. There are more than nine hundred known species, varying in size, appearance, and behavior. In general, you should find out exactly which type of spider is best for you before you buy it. Of course, it is important that you like the outside of the terrarium animal, but you should also know about its needs. So it is important to select and set up the terrarium according to the special requirements because there is no standard terrarium for beginners.
Regarding their way of life, tarantulas are usually divided into tree dwellers, ground dwellers, and earth-dwellers. Tree dwellers do best in a tall terrarium where they can set up their web between branches. Ground dwellers need cavities and tubes to hide and ground dwellers, whose origin is mostly in Africa or Asia, dig in vertically and build their dwelling underground, so they need a lot of substrates. The recommended minimum size for a tarantula terrarium is 30 x 30 x 30 centimeters, but the larger it is, the more comfortable it is for the resident. The ideal location for a terrarium is one that is stable, out of direct sunlight, and out of the reach of pets and young children.
The exact requirements of the desired animal can be found in pet shops. Here you can also get the necessary accessories and recommended specialist literature. Be careful with offers on the Internet, you should never buy a new animal that you have not personally inspected. So that no wild catches are supported, it is advisable to always give preference to offspring when buying pets.