Stories of Frustration

[Minkness]

I know it comes with the territory of having anything from baby humans to a motorcycle. Gotta take the bad with the good, doesn't mean we have to like the bad though. People are allowed to be frustrated by the things they love (like kids!).

Also, Lady B...frustrating as that must be...the way you wrote it made me kinda laugh....I'm sorry for your 'pain' though! ^_^;;

[lady_bug87]

I'm happy my pain amuses you ♡.

And snakes ain't got nothing on preschoolers

[Minkness]

Thank goodness for that! Lop

[lady_bug87]

When it comes time to pair her this winter I'm sure you'll be seeing a lot of posts outlining my frustration.

I'm sorry you're having a rough time with your bp.

[prairiepanda]

Not a snake issue, but I had a very frustrating experience trying to breed Phidippus regius(regal jumping spider). I had bred P audax(bold jumping spider) before without problems, so you'd think a species from the same genus would be a walk in the park for me. Far from it. I started with a 1.2 trio, but one of the females wasn't mature yet so she had to be shelved for a season. I introduced the mature female and male several times and saw no courtship whatsoever. So I cohabitated them. They were living together for 2 whole months before the male finally started dancing, and then the female suddenly decided she didn't like him. Miraculously, a couple weeks after breeding season should have ended, I saw 4 good insertions so I pulled the male out. That year, the female gave me a total of 8 beautiful egg sacs. Not a single one made it to full term!!! My girl would tend to them with full devotion for a couple weeks and then when the eggs got nice and big she ate them! After the 4th sac I started transferring them to an incubator. I tried 4 different incubation methods, but each time the eggs eventually stopped developing and decayed. The next spring, my other female had her maturing molt. THE DAY AFTER she matured, my male died. So I ordered a new male. Paired him with my younger female first, and she ate him, despite being very well fattened on crickets. Then no other males were available all year. My older female gave me a couple more sacs so I could watch them die. I haven't attempted breeding this species again since.

[jossh27]

Prairie, i always read your posts with the most outright respect but I'm sorry i laughed at the part where you said your female ate your male. Spiders scare the ***** out of me...i can't let one live when i see them In my house

[Minkness]

Oh wow Prarie! That IS frustrating! I'm sorry your ladies didn't work out for you =(

I have thought about a trantula once or twice...but just can't jump that hurdle. While I'm not exactly 'scared' of spiders, and find many to me amazingly beautiful and interesting to watch, the thought of purposefully keeping one in my home kinda weirds me out.

I'm happy people like you have a passion for them though! Maybe one day it will inspire me to take that leap and set up an enclosure with one. =)

[prairiepanda]

Originally Posted by jossh27

I'm sorry i laughed at the part where you said your female ate your male.

Cannibalism is always a risk when breeding any species of spider, so I was prepared for the loss, but it was quite a shock because in this case the odds of it happening were incredibly low! Not only was my female overfed, but jumping spiders in general don't have much tendency for cannibalism to begin with. They can even be kept communally with multiple species, if enough space is provided!

Spiders scare the ***** out of me...i can't let one live when i see them In my house

Okay, you're allowed to have your phobia. But you can't deny the cuteness of jumping spiders! Those giant eyes and floofy pedipalps are cuteness overload! Look at my girl "playing drums": https://instagram.com/p/pFdsztMzkI/ (that's the female who gave me 8 bad sacs)
By the way, I'm not offended when people like you say they kill every spider in their home. If you can't differentiate between harmless species and those with medically significant venom, you're better safe than sorry. I release spiders outside of they're not "hot", but I told my roommate to kill spiders on sight if I'm not home because some spiders here can pose a threat to my cat or reptiles. Any escaped pet spiders are an exception though, of course, and she knows them all

Originally Posted by Minkness

I'm happy people like you have a passion for them though! Maybe one day it will inspire me to take that leap and set up an enclosure with one. =)

Tarantulas are even more low-maintenance than snakes. They're also crazy cheap to care for and take up very little space. Feel free to message me if you ever decide to take the plunge; I'd be happy to help you get started. Just be careful; there are around 300 different tarantula species in the pet trade and they all have their own unique characteristics, so it's quite common for people to end up collecting them in crazy numbers! My collection included 21 Ts at one point, and even then it was considered to be a small collection. I've downsized quite a bit to make space for snakes.

[SnoopySnake]

Originally Posted by prairiepanda

Okay, you're allowed to have your phobia. But you can't deny the cuteness of jumping spiders! Those giant eyes and floofy pedipalps are cuteness overload! Look at my girl "playing drums":

That video was pretty funny, lmao.
Seriously though, who can deny these cuties? This one lived in my room all last summer.


My most frustrating snake problem is getting my SD retic out without getting peed on and him trying to fly out of my hands...

[lady_bug87]

Originally Posted by SnoopySnake

That video was pretty funny, lmao.
Seriously though, who can deny these cuties? This one lived in my room all last summer.


My most frustrating snake problem is getting my SD retic out without getting peed on and him trying to fly out of my hands...

I can! Me! Right here! This guy... er girl? Well in any case Me.

[Wingbeats]

I can share a little story of frustration!

I got my very first snake, a little rainbow boa worm. Then, two days later, she promptly escaped! I was simultaneously both really worried about her, and also really embarrassed for losing her.

Luckily I found her this morning, and have put her in a much more secure enclosure. Hopefully I won't have to stress over it again!

[Minkness]

Congrats on finding her =)

My crested geckos seem to escape the most....but I always find them again ^_^

[trailblazer295]

Originally Posted by prairiepanda

Okay, you're allowed to have your phobia. But you can't deny the cuteness of jumping spiders! Those giant eyes and floofy pedipalps are cuteness overload! Look at my girl "playing drums": https://instagram.com/p/pFdsztMzkI/ (that's the female who gave me 8 bad sacs) .

I'll give you the fact that, that is a cool video and funny. BUT owning a palm sized spider and holding one well.............NO THANKS ( I can't type my exact wording) I don't mind looking at them from behind glass at the zoo or at stores I've fine then. But A I wouldn't hold want to hold one and B seems like a very boring pet even more then snakes how much movement can an animal do in a 12x12 box.

[Deva]

I actually lost my first snake - a milk snake. It was horrible. I had the snake for a year, not any problems. I moved the snake to a larger terrarium and one day I found the snake in the water dish. I picked the snake up, and it felt like someone had painted her/him with shellac! Completely stiff. This snake got into such a condition that it would not shed, there were three or four layers on it. Even though I took it to a vet, it was too late and the snake never recovered. It died a couple of months after the vet visit.

I didn't give up on snake keeping and got a Thayeri Kingsnake which I have kept for two years and is doing great.

Things happen with reptiles that are beyond the knowledge of the average person.

[SoPhilly]

Deva, wow, that is awful, poor little guy . That sucks.

The most frustrating thing for me when I started keeping herps was just getting humidity and temp gradients right. It can take a long time and a lot of money to figure that stuff out - no matter how many books you read or forums you go to, you still have to figure out what's going on in YOUR tank , in YOUR house, with YOUR weird forced-air heating or whatever. I used to have tanks with several different tropical species of lizards and frogs together, and working at providing the right zones so no one got stressed and ate anyone else was a challenge. But, That's also kinda why I went in that direction with my herps - I kind of like obsessively setting up intricate habitats, I guess. Go hard or go home! Lol. And it gets a lot easier as you do it more.... it all started in 2003 with one green anole, haha.

Ps - I'm really amused by how many "snake people" find spiders to be "icky" C'mon guys! I'm allergic to spiders and
I still carry them outside, spiders are awesome friends who eat truly horrible bugs like mosquitoes! On whom I have no mercy.