# Feeding tarantulas



## kitkat_ (Aug 26, 2009)

Ok well hopefully I will be getting a tarantula soon, probably a mexican red knee or a chilean rose. I was wondering can u feed them crickets or locust? Is there really any difference and if there is what is it? It seem like most people feed crickets but they look a bit weird to me and don't they jump around alot more? I think I would rather have locusts lol. Also would I be able to leave them in the tub they come in if I jus buy however many I need for the week an get more for the next week instead of moving them and would I need to feed them?
Sorry if the questions seem a bit stupid lol.
Thanks, Katie.


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## garlicpickle (Jan 16, 2009)

There's not much difference when it comes to feeding spiders, although locusts will tend to climb the tank if they're not eaten straightaway, which then makes it hard for the T to reach them.

Locusts won't live long in the shipping tubs, they need to eat a lot of fresh greens and need a warm dry atmosphere. Black crickets will also not survive long in the shipping tubs as they need a lot of ventilation and space. They also smell terrible.

If you're only getting one spider, your best bet would be the brown or silent crickets. If you tip them out of the shipping tub into a plastic container with a few egg boxes or loo roll holders inside, chuck in some fish flakes and a bit of cabbage, cover the top with a piece of net curtain and secure with an elastic band, they will live for months.


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## GRB (Jan 24, 2008)

You can, and should, feed arachnids a varied diet. Locusts and crickets usually form the staple because they are the easiest to get hold of, but cockroaches are also used frequently. 

I usually rotate my animals on crickets (brown and black), roaches, trevo worms, waxworms and meal worms (both larva and the adult beetle). I then supplement this with additional insects I find from safe areas. 

The one thing to remember with locusts is that they sleep at night time when most T's are active, so feeding can be a bit hit and miss. Both crickets and locusts are easy to keep, although locusts require additional heat and do best at really warm temperatures. locusts should be fed fresh cut grass or bramble, whereas crickets will eat bran, vegetables, dogfood and other household foodstuffs.


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## sage999 (Sep 21, 2008)

My redknee and chilli are both fed crickets. As garlicpickle says locusts tend to climb out of reach. My only T that I feed locusts to is my T blondi as she tends to nail them as soon as they hit the deck.


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## Reptile-newb (Jul 13, 2009)

I feed mine on a staple of brown crickets, and sometimes a treat of a black cricket, dubia roach (and a few other species of feeder roach), mealworm, waxworm or locust. I usually have all of these around the house for some of my other herps anyway.

Also, never mix livefood species - I put a group of locusts that were around the same size as my black crickets with my black crickets one day, and the next day, there were some fat, happy black crickets waiting there. Well...at least they were gutloaded with something nutritious lol!


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## iiisecondcreep (Oct 29, 2007)

I use black crickets. 

Browns are too fast and jumpy, locusts are slower when walking but they are A LOT more likely to jump and they can jump quite far. Opening the lid is like opening those toy 'can of worms', they all go pinging everywhere. Blacks aren't very jumpy, and not as fast as browns.

Once they mature though they are VERY loud and need lots of food or they'll eat each other.


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## FreakOonique (Oct 1, 2008)

My spiddies get:

Crickets
Locusts
Morio worms/meal worms
Flies (that I hatch myself)
Moths
The odd pinky (once in a blue moon)


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## s_f_o_s (May 9, 2009)

iiisecondcreep said:


> I use black crickets.
> 
> Browns are too fast and jumpy, locusts are slower when walking but they are A LOT more likely to jump and they can jump quite far. Opening the lid is like opening those toy 'can of worms', they all go pinging everywhere. Blacks aren't very jumpy, and not as fast as browns.
> 
> Once they mature though they are VERY loud and need lots of food or they'll eat each other.


They are also one of the most foul smelling inverts I've ever encountered, the smell is second only to corn snake droppings and snake vommit. A regurgetated mouse is a highly unattractive thing.

I feed my Ts browns but I'm considering starting a roach colony. I can always kick back what I dont use to the local pet shop as live food as they dont have a supplier, they dont jump, arent particuluarly smelly and dont escape too easily.

Warning about brown crickets, they can and will often die in their container if you dont feed and provide som kind of fluid, I use bug gel, but if they get out they will find somewhere nice and warm and have a habbit of mulitplying....... THEY WILL GET OUT. Browns are like the invert SAS.


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## Mutley.100 (Nov 3, 2008)

I feed my smaller T's on crickets till they can take XL locust then it's locust all the way . I'm hoping to change this in the near future as I've had 2 starter colonies of cockroaches delivered today .


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## ex0tics (Jun 9, 2009)

I stick to crickets, I try roaches but the things just seem to burrow same with morios! :censor:


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## gazzab1990 (Jul 22, 2009)

I feed all of my spids crickets. When I first got them I couldn't even touch them, but the fear soon wore off. I order mine from a seller on ebay, they come in excellent quality tubs, all of them are alive when I get them through, and they're all nicely gut-loaded so my Ts are getting what they need out of them.

When I grab a tub from my LPS loads are usually dead already rotting at the bottom of the tub, and they look skinny. I think it's a better idea to order them online, and water the weird bacon-smelling cereal stuff they have in their tubs once a week which seems to keep them all alive without them laying eggs.


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## kitkat_ (Aug 26, 2009)

Well I guess I will buy something to keep my crickets in then. Do i need to put anything in the bottom of the box like substrate or paper or should you just leave them?
Thanks x


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## garlicpickle (Jan 16, 2009)

I put a layer of crushed up cheap weetabix in the bottom, about 1/2" deep. The crickets will eat it and it seems to stop smells too.


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## ph0bia (Feb 21, 2009)

GRB said:


> You can, and should, feed arachnids a varied diet. Locusts and crickets usually form the staple because they are the easiest to get hold of, but cockroaches are also used frequently.
> 
> I usually rotate my animals on crickets (brown and black), roaches, trevo worms, waxworms and meal worms (both larva and the adult beetle). I then supplement this with additional insects I find from safe areas.
> 
> The one thing to remember with locusts is that they sleep at night time when most T's are active, so feeding can be a bit hit and miss. Both crickets and locusts are easy to keep, although locusts require additional heat and do best at really warm temperatures. locusts should be fed fresh cut grass or bramble, whereas crickets will eat bran, vegetables, dogfood and other household foodstuffs.





Reptile-newb said:


> I feed mine on a staple of brown crickets, and sometimes a treat of a black cricket, dubia roach (and a few other species of feeder roach), mealworm, waxworm or locust. I usually have all of these around the house for some of my other herps anyway.
> 
> Also, never mix livefood species - I put a group of locusts that were around the same size as my black crickets with my black crickets one day, and the next day, there were some fat, happy black crickets waiting there. Well...at least they were gutloaded with something nutritious lol!





Tamz said:


> My spiddies get:
> 
> Crickets
> Locusts
> ...


These people earn my kudos 

A tarantula needs a varied diet. If you feed them only one food source "because it's easier" or "because I don't like how locusts look" then you're not caring for your pet properly as you're putting your needs above theirs. 
They can't complain and rely solely upon you for food.

The 'staple' of my tarantulas diets are crickets. Usually browns. They are gut-loaded by feeding them fresh greens etc. My girlfriend buys locusts for her reptiles, any she doesn't use get fed to my tarantulas on a rota._ (ie, one week my P.chordatus, T.ockerti and B.auratum would get the three left. Next week, four are left, so my P.murinus, B.smithi, H.albostriatum and S.dichromata will get them)_.

If one of the reptiles isn't hungry enough to eat all the pinkies, then my P.chordatus, A.seemanni, B.auratum or any of my mature females will get it.

Sounds a lot more complex than it is.


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## grumpyoldtrout (May 19, 2008)

gazzab, are you not risking loosing all the crix, they prefer dry conditions, and if yopu are mo0istening the bran, it could go mouldy, I use a small piece of carrot or apple as a water source for them, 250 in a largish faunarium with some of our roach food added, and they last for about 2 weeks.


Our Rose T gets Black Crix, the beardies will not eat brown, :blush: the odd locust, morio, Dubia roaches, and Pachnoda grubs. Pachnoda seems to be a big hit with her.  She will grab it even if it has burrowed a bit before she gets to it.










Thats the girl, I am not that fond of them, pachnoda that is, they bite! :lol2:


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## Reptile-newb (Jul 13, 2009)

The photo in the post above me is utterly gruesome.
RFUK really deserves an 18+ rating for so much insect gore.

lol


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## Lucifus (Aug 30, 2007)

Brown crickets or dubia cockroachs.


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