IRL Pets

[Jens]

now that's a name i haven't heard in a long time..

LECTURE MODE ON

Grammostola spatulata is the junior synonym of Grammostola porteri, which was for LONG time (and still mostly is) labeled Grammostola rosea, natural color form (NCF). The most recent research indicates that this 'natural color form' is, as I said, G.porteri, whereas what was/is labeled as Grammostola rosea, red color form (RCF) is the *real* G.rosea. Head hurts yet?

And well, despite being popular and widespread (They are still being imported from Chile, so almost every pet store has a G.porteri labeled either G.rosea, or some junior synonym in attempt to raise the price, or even just 'Chilean rose hair tarantula'.), I wouldn't recommend them for a starter. First of all, majority of them you are wild caught, as I mentioned, they could have parasites or other problems and die unexpectedly. A pet store might sell you a mature male, too - those don't last long - could be 'unidentified' to rise the price or they simply don't know - lotsa pet store employees don't know anything about spiders. (And that's why you also shouldn't buy any crap they will try to sell you along with the spider, should you decide to get one from pet store) Another major thing is that this species is known for 'mood swings', unpredictability, fasting for months and other peculiar behaviour. You can get one that's a total doll, docile and everything, one that's a psycho, or anything between. Hell, you can have a docile one, then it moults and becomes a psycho.

I'd personally go for a Grammostola pulchripes (Chaco golden knee) or Brachypelma albopilosum (Honduran curly hair), or if you want to spend more money, Grammostola pulchra (Brazilian black) - generally docile and calm, no big quirks (though you can always get a crazy specimen, no species is uniformly calm or defensive), ideal beginner tarantulas. Could also go for other Brachypelmas, such as B.smithi, the tarantula 'icon', or B.emilia, but those can be a bit nervous, skittish and more prone to kicking hairs.

Find a local breeder, visit an expo, or order a spider via Internet dealers. They won't try to sell you heat pads, hygrometers, thermometers and other useless crap and they mostly know what they're doing. Keeping a spider is extremely easy in most cases. You need a sufficient sized terrarium, in your case with more horizontal area than height, for example I like to use 30x30x20 (LxWxH) cm for my terrestrials, some substrate like eco earth, a water dish and something for the spider to hide in, and that's it. This goes for most of the New World terrestrial species, and as a beginner, those are what you should want. Forget about humidity, misting, they drink from water dish (you can use a bottle cap, even) - and anything that is NOT a laboratory grade humidity gauge is an useless piece of crap anyway. Forget about heating - the rule of thumb is that if you're comfortable wearing a t-shirt in the room, so is the spider (sans the T-shirt of course)

Visit arachnoboards.com for more info and advice, I'd also recommend the third edition of Tarantula Keeper's Guide by Stanley Schultz.