Humidity levels for spiderlings

[John Allison]

I hope you can advise me.

I am the happy owner of my first tarantula, a Grammostola pulchra spiderling approximately 2 cm leg span. I have set up the spider in a plastic container approx. 8cm by 14cm. I spray a little water in the container each day. The humidity gauge is regularly reading about 85% which is higher than the recommended humidity (up to 80%) for this species.

Will this level of humidity harm my spider, and if so, do you have any suggestions for reducing the humidity?

Thank you for any help you can give.

John

[Colin D Wilson]

In general, constant high humidity is detramental to (most) spiders as mould spores can grow in their lungs and prove to be fatal.

I would try lightly misting one side of the container once a week for a start, keep an eye on the humidity and if it is a little low to "the norm" then increase the misting to twice a week and see how that goes.

I wouldn't say it's "better" to have too low humidity as sometimes (with certain species) problems can occur with moulting, but occasionally too low is (in my opinion) better than constantly too high.
Some species can make do with the humidity gained from the evaporation from a water dish (this is mainly for adult specimens when using a dish though)

Wait for a few more members to give their opinions and ideas then take the most common pieces of advice from all the posts and you wont go far wrong.

[John Allison]

Thanks for your reply Colin - much appreciated. As this is my first spider, I am learning as I go, but its good to have sites such as this to ask for advice.

John