Tarantula

Rose Hair Tarantula

Range: Chili, South America

Habitat: Desert Regions , lightly forested habitats

Natural Diet: Insects, small vertebrates

Diet at RainForest: Crickets, cockroaches

Size: 2-4"' Females are substantially larger than males. Females are capable of living for over 20 years, males average approximately 4-5 years. Most spiders exhibit significant dimorphism.

RainForest Facts: A Tarantulas hairy covering actually has two separate functions. The first function of the hairs is to sense air movement around the spider, this allows the tarantula to both detect prey as well as warn the spider of potential enemies! The hairs are called urticating hairs, sounds a lot like irritating, and for good reason. The hairs will break off the abdomen and irritate the skin of other animals, including humans. Tarantulas can actually use their back legs to flick the hairs off their bodies and onto potential enemies!

Each Tarantula leg is made up of seven parts with two claws at the end and a tuft of hair for extra gripping power! A spider has eight eyes, they are very small and generally not very strong, the spider rarely depends on it's eyesight. Huge fangs actually help hold the prey item after the Tarantula has grabbed the food item.

Most Tarantulas do not hunt by building webs, they are generally more like a leopard or a cheetah, stalking slowly on the ground the spider will quickly pounce on and hold their food item while their powerful venom goes to work!

There are even various types of tarantulas that dwell in trees! The Pink Toe is a classic example of an arboreal tarantula. The Pink Toe will build it's nest under bark that may be pulling away from damage on a tree limb or branch, under this bark the spider will line the cavity with silk to create a safe, moist hiding place from which to hunt bugs!

The Tarantula has the amazing ability to regenerate a leg. In fact being closely related to crabs the best way to understand their regenerative powers is to simply look at the practice of fishing for Stone Crabs in Florida. Once the crab is caught the claw is broken off and the crab is thrown back into the water. The damage causes the animal to shed it's exoskeleton and and produce a new claw. The Tarantula can perform the same magic feat!

So the next time you order crab legs off the menu just remember, you are just eating a giant Tarantula!

What's In A Name?	Now That's a Big Spider
Where you live will often times determine what you call certain plants or animals. While people in the United States have given the name Tarantula to large, hairy spiders it is fun to learn that in places like Africa they call them Baboon spiders, and in South America they are known as monkey spiders!	For many thousands of years people have both feared and revered the spider. Ancient peoples of Nazca, Peru in South America created a drawing of a spider that was over 150 feet long!

Status in Wild: Stable, however continued pressure may result in a serious decline in wild populations. This spider is still imported in very large numbers for the pet trade. Captive breeding of this species of Tarantula is rare given the inexpensive cost of wild caught animals.