Some fuel on the fire... I know. But anyway.
Took some doing, but here is the exuvium of my P reduncus sling.
I would not want to go through this process for hundreds of slings to sell off the males, but either way.

This sling is approx. 3cm legspan.
What I learned:

• Quite troublesome to sex at this size, can't imagine doing this for hundreds of slings, but some might have OCD.
• But it is possible to sex. I used my camera with macro lens, nothing special. Keeping in mind that something could have in fact developed if it had been a female, but nothing visible in this instance.

I will keep track of this specific specimen and see what it turns out to be, and continue to sex all my slings (if possible) to see what a 2nd/3rd instar sling have developed sexual organ wise at such a young age.
It might be that nothing is visible at this age, based on Rick West's site by Mark R Hart : "The visual examination of even very small (2nd to 3rd instar) tarantula exuviae show the epiandrous ‘arch’ of fusillae as readily or more readily than the developing spermatheca of very young female tarantulas and, perhaps just as importantly can be seen within seconds on the live animal!" Although this refers to external indicators, not internal.

Can anyone please confirm that the female organs have not developed at 2nd/3rd instar?

Found this.
According to the post, it is the exuvium of a 0.75" A. chalcodes female.
atshq.org/boards/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=15542

As a point of interest. The one G pulchripes that differed from the other 2 indeed turned out to be female.
So I feel it is safe to say that at a certain age it gets easier to determine the sex from a G pulchripes ventrally, but would still confirm with exuvium.

Now it's just up to my B albopilosums to check them as well.

An old but interesting thread

I think that the "breeder" is pulling someones chain and is taking out of his backside.

Cenotaph wrote:
Quick question: at what 'age' is the sexual organs fully developed?

Fully developed as in the actual shape or developed enough ready for breeding ?

As far as I know the sexual organs start to develope around the 3rd to 4th moult when you can see them through a microscope (X40-60) They are small buds and clear like jelly at this size but still can be identified. Developed enough for breeding ? I would say generally around the 8th to 9th moult.

I have tried to sex slings on the 2nd moult but nothing can be seen, some slings show something on the 3rd moult but it is extremely hard to say for definate what the sex is.
From the 4th moult onwards it is usually quite easy to sex the moults even at a magnification of X20.
It can sometimes be confusing trying to sex a moult at this size as the male and female organs look the same and are sometimes even the same size.
The surest way is to look for the Uterus externus and the Bursa copulatrix, if you can see what looks like spermatheca but cannot see the Uterus externus then it is a male.

The actual size of the Tarantula has NO bearing on whether it is sexable or not, it is how developed it is and this can only be achieved by moulting.

I recently recieved a steromicroscope for my birthday and can say without doubt that it is SOOOOOOOO easy now to sex sling moults now. I got a good deal on mine from Amazon CLICKY


If anyone is interested, I have a PDF of "Sex determination of immature Theraphosid spiders from their cast skins" by Kathleen and John Hancosk of the BTS which was a 4 part correspondence course.

If you send your email to me via PM I'll send it to you or i'll send it to one or two people and then it can be passed along to others.

hi that guy is talking alot ok bull i think it is like a lucky packet :lol: :lol:

I have to think it's kak too!
If you buy the spider with the intention to breed and make money, then what's the prob if u get a male?? It matures faster, it can "impregnate" dozens of available females. So besides for the fact that it's life Span is shorter, what are the cons of owning males?? I don't see the prob?

If you are buying with the intention to love and admire the creature, then it won't matter to you what sex it is..

On another note; breeders of certain pure bred cats and dogs will only sell spayed or neutered animals to ensure they don't end up supplying potential competitors, so if breeders are selling only males (rolling my eyes) it's their prerogative to do so. Breeding is their bread and butter.


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