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Avicularia urticans
(Peruvian pinktoe)
Tarantula Care in Captivity
by Todd Gearheart
 Described
by: Schmidt, 1995 (?)
Distribution: Tropical rain
forests of the NW Amazon region. Exported mainly
out of NE Peru.
Size: Spiderlings emerge as
1/2" 1st instar. Mature males may reach a
legspan of 5.5" and have a purple sheen on
the carapace on on the femurs of the legs. Adult
females may reach 6² in leg span and weigh 1
ounce or slightly more.
Growth rate: Males take 1-1.5 years to mature.
Females take 2-3 years. They will molt (shed
their exoskeleton) 4-6 times the first year, and
then molt once a year after that.
Temperature: Keep 80-90F. They can take drops to
70F for short periods of time as long as
they have made their tube web shelter. Keep your
tarantula's enclosure away from windows,
sunlight, heaters and air conditioning.
Humidity: 80-90%. Keep substrate slightly moist
and provide a shallow water dish. Spray
spiderling pill bottles once a week lightly. The
substrate should NOT be "swampy" nor
should it be so dry that if you were to blow on
it particles would go up in the air.
Habitat type/enclosure/substrate needed: This is
an arboreal, rain forest species found in
"tube webs" in crevices of trees and on
rain forest vegetation. Keep adults in 5-10
gallon tanks with 2-3" peat moss/vermiculite
mix with cork bark shelter leaning against the
side of the tank or placed in middle.
"Tubular" cork bark with a 180 degree
arcs works best. Use a tank that is taller than
is wide. Spiderlings will need to be keep in pill
bottles with peat moss/vermiculite mix for 1st
six months, then moved to 8 and 16 ounce deli
cups as they get bigger. Make sure your lid on
top is secure. A good tank for adult tarantulas
are "Critter Cages" with sliding and
locking lids. Live plants that need little light
and have strong branches and leaves can be used
also.
Food: Feed prey that is smaller than the length
of the tarantula¹s body. You can use
"pin-head" crickets, but these must be
1-2 week old crickets and very small as they will
eat your spiderling when it tries to molt.
Adults can be fed large crickets,
flying insects and anole lizards and house
geckos. Make sure all insects come from
non-pesticide areas. Feed spiderlings twice a
week a couple of prey items. Feed adults once a
week a couple of insects and occasionally an
anole lizard or house gecko. They rarely go
off-feed for longer than one month, and this is
usually due to an expected molt.
Cleaning: To keep your tarantula¹s tank clean
and keep your animal healthy, get in the routine
of feeding your tarantula one day, and then
coming behind the next day and taking long
tweezers and picking out any left-over prey
remains. Keep the water dish (it must be shallow
and wide) clean at all times. If you follow this
advice, you will need to only change out your
substrate (vermiculite, peat moss, sand mixture)
once every six months or so. Because of the
higher humidity requirements of this species,
keeping a clean tank is very, very important.
Longevity: A. urticans are fast growers and are
somewhat short lived compared to Brachypelma
spp.. Males will probably only live to be 2-4
years old while females may live over 12 years
old.
Handling/Disposition/Venom:
Freshly-caught A. urticans can be semi-aggressive
and skittish when first imported and sold, but
after being acclimated, they tend to calm down
and can come across as somewhat docile, but
usually remain skittish like most arboreals. They
do have urticating hairs, but instead of throwing
them, they just knock them off onto your hand if
held. Some hobbyists may react badly to these,
but in general, most hobbyists don't react too
much to Avicularia spp. hairs. Use long
(12-18" forceps) to do tank maintenance. The
genus Avicularia doesn't contain any species that
have a medically significan't venom, but
individual keepers may have some reaction to a
bite. Best advice: Don't
handle. Tarantulas are not "pets", but
"display animals" much like keeping
fish. They don't understand nor have a need to be
handled. They are venomous like many spiders, but
their venom is not dangerous unless your allergic
to their venom. Don't find out! Transfer your
tarantula using "cup-to-tank" method.
Captive breeding: Fairly easy. Adults breed
easily and eggsacs are commonly produced in
captivity. Captive born spiderlings are always
available on the market.
Record keeping: Keep good notes such as the stock
#, if any , that it was sold as, when born, molt
dates, etc.
To find out more about this animal and the
Tarantula Keeping hobby, I recommend the
following:
Read these books: "Tarantulas and Other
Arachnids" by Sam Marshall, "Keeping
and Breeding Tarantulas in Captivity" by
Ronald Baxter, Andreas
Tinter's "Tarantulas Today" and Stanley
and Marguerite Schultz's "The Tarantula
Keeper's Guide". Buy copies of WEBBINGS
Invertebrate Magazine. (email:
tgearhea@peganet.com) or visit
www.petbugs.com/webbings Join the Southwest
Florida Tarantula Society (SWFTS) contact at:
(email: tgearhea@peganet.com, and the British
Tarantula Society (BTS) to obtain the bi-monthly
newsletter, The Journal. Join the Arachnid
Mailing Lists on the internet. Copyright © 1999
by Todd Gearheart
Reprinted here with
permission
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