So my Tarantula molted...
By voodooterror 106 Comments
My beautiful Chilean Rose named Danica :D
Anyway, i realised she was preparing for a molt (when an immature arachnid sheds its exoskeleton to allow growth). Basically what they do is lay a web "molting mat" and stop eating for a period of time before it (the amount of time varies greatly, ive had some fast for a few week, others a few months).
I woke up in the morning and noticed that she was pretty much flat on her back. Inexperienced arachnid owners could be fooled into thinking that they're dead as they look, well, dead. But if you look close enough you will see slight movement in their legs.
![Blurry image but you get the idea =]](https://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/original/0/2843/1455986-26893_10150167107120478_570420477_11744091_6451901_n.jpg)
She was like that for a good 1.5 to 2 hours before she managed to break through the carapace, and that's when things got a little gross because watching a tarantula pull itself out of itself is both amazing and disgusting!
After another 40mins or so she finally started making some progress on getting those legs of hers free, which is also the most crucial and nail-biting part of a molt, because if the humidity in the vivarium had been too low during the tarantula's prep for it, her legs could quite easily have gotten stuck and the only option then would have been to 'put her out of her misery'. (for the record, she's perfectly fine and her legs didnt get stuck =])
After another 30mins her legs were pretty much free and all that was left was to rest and to get her bum free of the old exoskeleton.
Here are some final pics showing her freshly molted and her old exoskeleton...
![there she is, in her new 'skin' =]](https://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/original/0/2843/1455989-26893_10150167239495478_570420477_11748885_7781744_n.jpg)
I can't help but be really amazed by being able to witness something like this, i've seen a lot of T's molt and still get stunned every time.
just looking at the old 'shell' and how they just pull themselves out of it blows my mind.
sorry if you're grossed out by arachnids :P
106 Comments