Recording

[Tracy Sherwood-Farnfield]

I was (also) just wondering what sort of records *you* keep on your Ts?

I have been keeping a record of feeding, but wondered what details the rest of you made note of and if you have any favoured way of doing this.

I ask because I noticed that the mating and bite details in the BTS journal are very detailed, and, as a scientist appreciate that accurate recording can only aid the furthering of our understanding of our furry eight-legged friends.

[Kirk McNulty]

Hi Tracy, I've just started keeping notes on mine, I record where and when bought incase it is ever used for breeding, how much, tank size and set up, T size and moults, lengths inbetween moults,feeding and I'm hoping to video record a breeding attempt soon but not sure I'll see how things go. Pretty much anything that may help someone else, hope this helps.

[Louise~Nichols]

Hiya Tracy,
I keep records of pretty much everything...temperatures at different times of year to simulate seasons etc, matings: times and dates, feeding dates and food taken (as well as refusals), moult dates, and when there are eggsacs, I date development of the eggs through to slings etc.
It keeps on top of all the major and minor details of my spiders' lives, and allows me something to peruse over if one of the collection is looking a bit *down* or *feeble*.
I keep my feed and moult records in a mini-postcard system, each spider has a name and reference number...and I can flick through the cards to update quickly or cross reference as and when necessary.
When a female is mated I have a breeding diary where I enter all of my breeding data concerning that particular female...and like wise I have an eggsac diary for data on the different clutches. It's all much the same as I do for my snake breeding.

Hope that's of use to you.

[David Blair]

Hi Tracy, I use a piece of software writen specifically for keeping record of T's and find it very usefull

http://www.freewarefiles.com/The-Tarantula-Keepers-Record-V_program_16655.html

you can print out small or full reports at a click, really usefull, I recommend it A+++

edit; meant to add as far as I see it has no spyware or malware that my scanner picked up, and was custom made so I dont believe there are any nasties with it.
Hope it helps

[Kate Arbon]

I'm pretty obsessive with note keeping. I have a spider book, which is just a note book in which each T has their own page. I note down their species and info about when I got them such as date, shop, size, etc. Then keep a record of all their feedings, moults and anything of interest such as behaviour changes, to try and learn their patterns so I can predict moults. I also have an MS Word document with all the same info in much more neatly. Plus an excel document which I record all their moults in so that I can make graphs to compare growth rates of different spids. Yes, I am a bit of a nerd

I figure, we all know a bit about tarantulas, but the wealth of knowledge about them is not as great as a lot of other animals. When I get my own place and have the room I plan to pick a species of T and get a large number of slings from different eggsacs, and keep detailed records on them as they grow, so hopefully we can figure out some more definite stuff about them.

[Tracy Sherwood-Farnfield]

Hi Tracy, I use a piece of software writen specifically for keeping record of T's and find it very usefull

http://www.freewarefiles.com/The-Tarantula-Keepers-Record-V_program_16655.html

you can print out small or full reports at a click, really usefull, I recommend it A+++

edit; meant to add as far as I see it has no spyware or malware that my scanner picked up, and was custom made so I dont believe there are any nasties with it.
Hope it helps

Thanks for that David, I will have a look at it when I get home (currently at school and sites with downloadable softwarew are blocked!)

I am currently keeping feeding records on a calendar form, but it is interesting to get an idea of the breadth of info that everyone else keeps.

[Tom Forman]

I'm pretty obsessive with note keeping. I have a spider book, which is just a note book in which each T has their own page. I note down their species and info about when I got them such as date, shop, size, etc. Then keep a record of all their feedings, moults and anything of interest such as behaviour changes, to try and learn their patterns so I can predict moults. I also have an MS Word document with all the same info in much more neatly. Plus an excel document which I record all their moults in so that I can make graphs to compare growth rates of different spids. Yes, I am a bit of a nerd

I wouldn't call that nerdy, I would call that the opposite of lazy but I am too lazy to look up that word right now :P

ps: if you feel extra motivated you could keep a record of my spiders for me heehee, I never get round to it.