Breeding Aphonopelma iodius

[michael martus]

Hello everyone,

I am curently in the prosess of trying to breed a beautiful pair of A. iodius. I have obtained a little information on how to complete this magical process, but would like to be able to have my best shot at it.

As my first breeding, is there any helpful tips and pointers form anyone that has had experiance in breeding that will help me out a bit? Your imput will be greatfully appreciated for any help that can be provided.

Thanks a ton! -Mike-

[Peter Lacey]

The person you want to speak to is Colin Wilson, he had 2 successful breedings from this species and most of the A. iodious in the country are down to him - its all his fault!!!

[James Box]

hopefully Colin's kept Toran Tanner's breeding notes as he's out of the hobby now...i'm hoping to do the same, when mine mature in a few more years. (edit: that's breed this species, not leave the hobby!)

what size are your spiders, Michael? i have slings from Toran's first success with them in the UK, and they're about half grown now, at about 2". are you in the UK? i'm curious where you managed to get adults?

they are an underrated species, now mine have started taking on adult colouration, they are really striking!
good luck with the breeding!

[michael martus]

You got me haha, no i do not live in the U.K. I live in the U.S. in Los Angeles, California where i am able to catch Aphonopelma wildly.
With a little bit of luck, i'm confiden that i will be able to sucsessfully breed them.
I havn't introduced them yet because i'm still setting tarreriums, and cages up for when its time to seperate everybody.

When that time comes, i know slings are extreamly fragile and delicate, what would be the most effective way of catching and seperating all the little fellows? i know there will be a lot of them and it wont be the most fun of tasks, (just because cage transferes are stressfull on everyone), but would anyone have little tricks that would make transfering the little guys to thier cages a little less extream?

[Colin D Wilson]

To correct Peter slightly and re-iterate what James has said, the majority of the slings knocking around are due to Torans breeding (the UK first) so all congratulations should rightly be his. I have a few of these that i'm growing on as they're a good example of the species.
I had a limited success sac from a female i bought as something else (as per usual) and from a lucky find with a male from an "ignorant petshop" whilst on a business trip.
Some of these slings seemed to struggle with feeding and moulting at first so they've been closely monitored and are now looking to be more hardy.
I wanted to see if cooling/heating and dampening provided triggers for egg sacs and this seemed to be the oportune time to try some alternate "rapid seasoning" ideas i had read/heard about.
My notes are still back in England but from memory..... the male was always kept quite cool (74-76 ish), the female was dampened quite heavily, left to cool for a couple of weeks then brought to temp (82/84)over a couple of days, they were introduced and successful insertions observed (repeated two days later with no success). She was left at temp for a couple of months and then cooled back to 74/76 deg. A month later she was quite heavily dampened with luke warm water and brought up to temp (80+) sac produced two (or so) months later (memory blip ).
The egg sac had to be pulled as the female showed signs of lethergy and started to drop the sac haphazardly around the tub (G rosea syndrome ).
Sac was small and only a dozen or so eggs (out of around 20) were found to develop.
The female died a month later during moult, this coupled with the small sac could be an indication she was an old specimen.

[Colin D Wilson]

When that time comes, i know slings are extreamly fragile and delicate, what would be the most effective way of catching and seperating all the little fellows?

A soft paint brush and (hopefully) a lot of empty 35mm film pots half full of substrate

[michael martus]

Thank you very much ,
very cool, i've been trying to set up for as many slings as possible so film canisters will work great, i have also been finding a lot of contriticting information on when to seperate the slings from the mother. I've herd that they should be removed either right after thier first molt, to not till thier third molt, if you wouldn't mind, what size do you remove your slings at?

[Colin D Wilson]

opinions on what is the right time (if any) vary amoungst breeders.
Many people pull sacs from the female, many leave to natural incubation, a few (like myself) will "play it by ear" and act accordingly (sometimes with unexpected results )
I personally have no set time and have taken sacs from females a couple of days after laying right through to leaving the slings to dispurse all around the tank when they're ready to.

[James Box]

good luck, Michael!
glad you posted that info Colin, in 10-20 years when mine mature (lol) i'll be searching the forum for it!