Last week we got a pet tarantula at our library. It is a Chilean Rose Hair tarantula which you can see pictured above. Our summer reading theme is about bugs so I convinced my manager to let us get a tarantula. It was all donated by a local pet shop and they're giving us free crickets and letting us change out the tarantula if we want to.
I thought we would get more negative reactions about the tarantula at the library. More "ewwwws" and "eeeeks" but instead we got "ah cools" and "wows." The kids really like her a lot. I would have to say they like the tarantula more than the staff. Some of our customer service staff won't go anywhere near the cage.
If any library is looking for a pet I would recommend a tarantula. They don't smell. You feed them once a week and they are very easy to care for. You can even pet and hold them. I've taken her out and let her crawl on my hands (although some people don't recommend doing that.) Tarantulas are not a pet somebody sees everyday so they have a "wow" factor. They have different types and some are more colorful than the rose hairs although rose hairs are very tame and easy going. So why not try a tarantula?
Saturday, May 17, 2008
Pet Tarantula
Posted by Carrie at 1:38 PM
Labels: tarantulas
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6 comments:
Ohh! Like the background change. Do you do the images up top in your header?
As for why no holding them...Cause they bite and are poisonous and can kill you and are hairy and big and mean and creepy and are spiders?!?! Just a thought... :-) (not a spider fan you see)
It's not good to hold tarantulas because they do bite. Their bites are like bee stings though, they are not too venomous like black widows. Another reason not to hold tarantulas is they have hairs on their bellies that they can shoot out at you. These hairs have spines that if they get in you they can make you itch. If you get these hairs in your eyes or mouth it can mean big trouble. So you have to be pretty careful. But you really shouldn't be afraid of the big scary tarantulas, it's the little itty bitty spiders that you should be afraid of.
Yes, now I am having visions of spiders shooting hairs at me. *shudders*
But really - tarantulas aren't super poisonous?? I thought they ranked right up there with black widows and other "they can kill you within moments if you don't get help asap!" kinds of spiders... Interesting.
I just bought a tarantula today and its really cool, and yes they are supposed to only be about as bad as a bee sting if they bite. they are not mean or anything, although i have heard something kinda like the hairs shooting out of the stomach i have never heard it like that. i have looked at website to website and I Think that is a different tarantula that can make u itch. they are usually like the... local ones in Utah, around Utah county in the mountains. none more in the American fork aria though. I just recently caught 10 of a really neat type in 4 days! well that's all i have to say.
Once, I did battle with several tarantulas in a Honduras shower. Let us not get into specifics. I am here, and they, they are down the drain.
Tarantulas (Rose Hair's) do shoot their belly hair's...me & my boyfriend found this out the hard way.
We had no idea that they could shoot their hair's...well we took her out of her tank and let her walk around on the carpet...well not thinking about the Tagu and the Python's that had been on the carpet...well she got scared and shot her hair's...we didnt know what was going on...his hand is itching....the back of my neck was super itchy.....and this lasted for 3 days.....horrible!
So BE CAREFUL!!!
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