Visitors to House of Oracles over the next few days will notice unusual behavior from the blood red-legged tarantula--dubbed Betty by our gallery monitors--in Huang Yong Ping’s installation The Wise Man Learns from the Spider How to Spin a Web (she’s enclosed in the cage above the table in this photo): the spider has flipped on her back. But Registrar Gwen Bitz assures everything’s fine.
“I called Bruce at Twin Cities Reptiles to find out what I should do,” she says. “He informs me that she is in the molting process, shedding her skin. She has been losing hair off of her butt and her back in the past week. The skin on her back has probably split and she takes the prone position to protect her back. The molting process takes about 48 hours. Sometimes they do not survive the process, but we are confident she will be okay.”
Should you visit, though, don’t disturb Betty. Eightlegs.org writes that molting (called ecdysis) is a “stressful activity that consumes every ounce of its energy. The tarantula will pump fluid pressure in its body to get the carapace to pop off first. The opisothoma or abdomen will split along its sides, and the spider will continue to slowly, almost imperceptibly, pump fluid in its limbs to ooze the old skin off its legs. The process can take anywhere from 15 minutes to several hours.”
[Photo: Gene Pittman]
I think it would be more effective if you were to put this information in the gallery with the spider to insure the guests will not disturb the process.
Comment by Jasmine — 12/12/2005 @ 7:48 pm
Betty is dead, Rhoda is our new Spider
Comment by Jasmine — 12/20/2005 @ 9:47 pm
If the cage isa the “birdcage” above the table I’m not suprised, most tarantulas are solitary, shy creatures and prefer some type of hide space they can retreat to. Too much sound or movement stresses them out if they have nowhere to escape. The loss of the hair on the abdomen shows that the tarantula was flicking or throwing her hair (a natural irritant) which is her primary defense mechanism.
I think tour exhibit is cruel. If you tied a puppy to a tree and consrtantly threw firecrackers at it it would be about the same effect as you had on that tarantula. I wonder how many you’ll go thru?
Comment by George — 1/10/2006 @ 6:03 pm
spiders are not puppies
Comment by sades — 2/24/2006 @ 10:23 am