Mature Male Tarantulas

Notes on Mature Male Tarantulas/age.

This is  a quick note I may clean up later – just so I don’t have to repeat myself everytime I mention mature males in my blog.

How long tarantulas live (naturally minus disease, accident  or predation)  depend on a variety of factors.   Different species have different life spans.   If you feed them a lot they will molt more and grow up faster- but it will shorten their life in the long run.    And then there is gender.   For many species a female is capable of living 20 to 30 years.  (waits for you to get up from your faint).    But males… once they mature they only have one thing on their mind.  (Disclaimer, somewhat adult content).  

When a male T matures, their body changes.  

Quick rundown – T’s molt.  They have a set size on their exoskeleton and in order to grow there body’s create a newer larger one and they molt out of the old one.    (Not everyone knows this)

The last molt to maturity changes the male – most (not all) species will get hooks on their front legs (helps with holding the female)  and their pedipalps  (look like shortened legs but they are not)   change to be more bulbous – looking like boxing gloves – in order to hold sperm.    (they deposit the sperm a pouch on the female)    here is a wiki on them:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedipalp  note the second section.  

So when a male (if he makes it this long) molts again… he often will get stuck and the old molt will harden around him.  (Happened with one of mine.)  

Most of the time though they ware themselves out looking for a female.   

Or the female eats them.

Or you hit them with your car because they are crossing the road looking for a female.  

So they will live only a few months to two or three years.     Depending on species and how often you feed them… they will go from baby to mature in 6 months to 10 years.