H.schmidti male help

[Samantha Lewanewsky]

What I was talking about was in that link I posted earlier, and of course Schmidt couldn't rename H.vonwirthi as H.volkervonwirthi because I don't think it's allowed! But the species is definitely in the World Spider Catologue for now, so it's a species. It may be temperary or not, but from what I read, more work with the vonwirthi needs to be done before anyone can strike it off or say that it's definitely not a minax. For now it's H.vonwirthi, and I still think that's what you have.

[stephen hendrick]

ok i suppose i'll have to wait and see then, thanks for your help anyway, probably have more for you to try and ID soon. the shop i use can never get it right.

regards,

SH

[Nicola Dolby]

Stephen, your spider is identical to the minax I bought from the Spider shop a couple of months ago. So unless there has been a major mess up, its a minax!

[stephen hendrick]

to be honest i was hoping it was a minax, i've always wanted one since i got the cobalt. thanx nic

[SylviRigden]

H longipes is relatively easy to tell as it has enlarged scopular pads on leg IV and long setae on tarsus IV. Here is my longipes - you can see the long hairs and the enlarged pad on the leg concerned in the photo, they also have 'V' markings on the posterior patella and no mottling between their chevrons.

[SylviRigden]

I have read in a thread that H vonwirthi is the same as H sp vietnam and a description given was - gunship grey, has mottled chevrons on abdomen and orangeish spinnerets. Your 'minax' looks like it has orangish spinnerets in the photo, plus it has their gold patellas on the posterior legs. I agree with Samantha on it possibly being H vonwirthi.

[stephen hendrick]

I don't know if there is a way to say this without sounding stupid, but i don't really know what scopular pads,tarsus or patellas are. i'm fairly new to the more detailed side of tarantula keeping ie, bioligy. but i would be interested to find out more.

[SylviRigden]

I had Soren explain them all to me a year or so ago on another forum lol.
Patella's are the knees, scopula pads are those short hairs on the bottom of the feet that the spider walks on, the tarsus is the end leg segment. The legs are numbered I to IV starting at the head end.
In the photo of my H longipes you can see the vivid gold knees on legs 3 and 4 ( III and IV ) and you can see the much furrier end of the 4th leg, and just in the shot the very edge of the pad she walks on.
Have a browse through this thread, its some pages long but all the photos are still present and you can see quite clearly what I mean.

http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?t=113498

Here is another one that goes into the leg lengths -

http://www.the-t-store.co.uk/forum/index.php?showtopic=9150&st=25

which seem to be the best way to id them all. Your spider looks much like mine from the photo, but it hasn't got the furry 'boots'. The main thing I was looking at were the orangish coloured spinnerets which longipes doesn't have. If you pop into the Members Gallery Soren has some photos of H minax in his collection, which you can also compare with your spider, you may need to measure some legs to be absolutely sure of its id.

[Nicola Dolby]

Here are a couple of pictures I managed to dig out from when I first got my minax. As I've mentioned the spid has moulted since then (now looks like it may well be a male after all) and all of the brown colouration has gone. The spider has also developed the patella chevrons. Sorry about the picture quality on the second and third pics.

[Samantha Lewanewsky]

Ooh lovely Nicola! Good pics, don't know many people who'd be brave enough to get that close to a Haplopelma!!

[stephen hendrick]

i'm asuming that its a vonworthi in the pics???, the chevron markings on the abdomen arn't verry visible, do you know what the common name of a vonworthi is, because iv'e heard people describe the minax as a vietnam black and a thai black... i'm confused. i'm sorry i ever obtained this species, the ID process is burning my head out..lol. and any information obtained by other members doesn't really concrete it for me. i will upload some close-up pics to try and hurry the process.

[stephen hendrick]

New ID pics













sorry about the quality of the last two, but you can just make out the orange on the spinners. i hope these pics shed more light than the original.

[SylviRigden]

Don't loose heart Steve it's all part of the fun of T's, you can't go to the pet shop and get a book off the shelf that tells you everything you want to know.
Your spider is a beauty and H vonwirthi we think looking at the photo, taking into account its colouring and the spinnerets. A bit of leg measuring will help to confirm it.

Nicola's spider was bought as a minax, but I'm not sure about that lovely fringe which it has around its carapace. I don't think minax have fringes.
Just to add to the conspiracy I think it looks like this -

http://asianarboreals.googlepages.com/ornithoctoninaeg.sp.%22orangefringed%22

[stephen hendrick]

i know, but the similarities of all these sp are really close to call. as you can see from the pics mine is missing a fringe aswell, this is a major contributer to my confusion. (minax or vonworthi???) i'm pretty sure (from evidence i have seen) that its not a longipes. but there again visual comparison isn't always accurate.

[SylviRigden]

Well, to my knowledge ( where is Soren when you need him! ) none of the minax group ( minax, lividum, longipes, vonwirthi, albostriatum ) have a fringe, so yours wouldn't have one. Going on comparing photos only, your spider has very prominent gold patellas on legs III and IV, and orange spinnerets, I haven't seem a picture of a minax yet that has them.
I don't think Nicola has a minax either, so don't compare yours to hers, go into the galleries and have a look at some confirmed minax pictures. If you want to be definitely sure you will need to measure legs and maybe even get a molt examined, but unless you are breeding it, then photo evidence may be good enough.