My Journey With My Very First GBB

from The Spinnerette, Issue 8: Chromatopelma cyaneopubescens

by The Spinnerette - Tarantula + Spider Magazine

Caring For GBB

By Hollie (Princess Sophie Pink)

Hollie, also known as Princess Sophie Pinkon YouTube, was gifted a Green Bottle Blue tarantula by fellow YouTuber Peter Webster. Here, Hollie shares her knowledge and experience with this species PLUS a very interesting molting issue she encountered!

I got my first Green Bottle Blue tarantula when I had been in the hobby for about 3 months. I was lucky enough to be sent one as a gift from Peter Webster. I always wanted a GBB because if the colouration. They are beautiful. I thought it was a male so named it Webster. But he is a she now!! I have still kept the name Webster, though.

Since owning Webster she has been good to watch. She has webbed up all of her enclosure. Sometimes she gets a bit skittish but has never threat posed me. This is because other than feeding and maintenance, I leave her alone.

I wouldn't try to handle her just because of how fast she is and you never know what mood she is in. She thinks everything is food and I wouldn't want her to mistake me for a locust!

Photo Credit: Rachel Greenhalgh

Her enclosure is one of my favourites, it has a colourful dragon and a bridge in the enclosure. It's like a dragon's cage. It gives lots of anchor points for the web.

I feed her locusts mainly but sometimes wax worms and I give her water and make sure to give the enclosure a little mist every now and then.

They are really good to keep because of the amount of webbing they do. It is so nice to see. When I get up at night for the bathroom it is always out wandering around making webs, it is so cool. She is really skittish though and has flicked hairs a few times so I have to be careful of that when opening the enclosure. A few months ago she moulted upright and got stuck in her moult so she amputated the 2 back legs! It just shows how clever she is. She would have probably died if she hadn't done that. ] ]

She just did a big pull away from her moult and then there were 2 bubbles of cloudy liquid (tarantula blood called hemolymph) where her legs should have been.

It didn't bleed very much but it was really scary to watch. Her legs were just left in her moult. After that we made sure she had a bit more moisture than usual to help her recover. We were worried she wouldn't make it but she did and now she is extra special. She recovered well from it and it didn't affect her at all only having 6 legs. She moulted upright again the next time and I was really really worried.

But she grew her back legs back! She can't actually use them because they are bent funny so she kind of drags them along but she is doing fine and hopefully next time she moults she will be good as new.

Regrowing her legs... As you can see they're bent but it doesn't affect her.

The moult where Webster pulled away from her exoskeleton, legs still attached.

I hope to buy a GBB sling as I really like the colours and pattern changes they go through with each moult.

ABOUT HOLLIE To see more from Hollie, you can check out her YouTube channel, Princess Sophie Pink or follow her Facebook page!

David Andrzejewski is ALWAYS there to answer any questions we have. He helped us and advised us what to do through the bad moult. He is just awesome x ] ] A SPECIAL THANK YOU