N.B. For regular visitors to this page please look below the first two pictures for Smartie's VERY EXCITING baby news - in March 2012 he fathered around 150 babies (spiderlings) as part of a successful breeding loan at Bristol Zoo!  Many more details below...

This absolutely beautiful spider is a mature male ANTILLES PINK TOED TARANTULA or MARTINIQUE PINK TOED TARANTULA, a species which in the wild lives in the trees of the warm tropical rainforests on the islands of Martinique & Guadeloupe in the Caribbean.  This lovely spider is named Smartie due to his fabulous mixture of colours! 

In September 2011, at just 13 months old, Smartie moulted for the final time to become sexually mature. It is almost impossible to tell whether a tarantula is male or female until their moult to maturity but as soon as Smartie had moulted for the final time I knew that he was definitely a male, not a female as I had hoped.  This was very sad because once they have reached maturity the males of this species do not typically live more than a few months, whereas a female might live for more than ten years.  Having grown very attached to him and his beauty this was very sad news indeed, particularly as I have watched him grow from a tiny baby to an amazing adult.

Whilst I was very disappointed to discover that he was in fact male, I was delighted when a friend of mine who works at Bristol Zoo's Bug World asked if I could consider lending them Smartie on a breeding loan as they had an adult female but not a male!  I agreed to lend Smartie to the zoo because I thought it would be fantastic if Smartie's legacy (as well as bringing so much pleasure to the many people who he had met to that point during his time here) could involve him fathering some babies.   

In October 2011 he was handed over to the zoo and stayed there for several weeks, during which time he was introduced to their female a number of times. This picture shows one of these pairings: 

Whilst there was no guarantee that the pairings would be successful I was absolutely thrilled when the zoo confirmed in February 2012 that their female had laid an egg sac (pictured below photographed on 17th February 2012):

Photograph courtesy of Carmen Solan

The fantastic news is that more than 150 babies (spiderlings) hatched just five days after the picture above was taken!!  I first visited the zoo to see the spiderlings on 27th February 2012 when they were just five days old, very tiny and looked like this:

For a few weeks after hatching the spiderlings are a bit like 'eggs with legs' and quite immobile, clearly looking VERY different indeed from the way that Smartie himself looks!  The pictures below were both taken on 14th March 2012 when the spiderlings were a little more developed, although still largely immobile:

Photographs courtesy of Mark Bushell

The pictures below were taken on 21st March 2012 and show just how remarkable the colour change in the spiderlings was in the seven days since the above pictures were taken!

Photographs courtesy of Carmen Solan

The pictures above show the spiderlings as they looked just before they moulted their exoskeletons again and become the beautiful turquoise and fluffy (and highly active) spiderlings which babies of this species are known for!  This occurred on March 25th 2012 and here is a picture of the first one emerging from its old exoskeleton:

Photograph courtesy of Carmen Solan

Here is the scene just a few hours later when a great many more of them had moulted!!!

Photographs courtesy of Carmen Solan

You can clearly see the incredible colour change in the pictures above, with the first one in particular showing perfectly how beautifully blue they are at this stage.  What the picture directly above shows brilliantly is just how very large each spider is compared to their cream-coloured discarded exoskeletons (exuviae).  Having said that each individual is still less than 10mm across at this stage!

I would like to say a huge public thank you to Mark Bushell - Bristol Zoo's Assistant Curator of Invertebrates - and the rest of the Bug World team at Bristol Zoo for their excellent work and also for keeping me informed at every step of the way! 

All of this baby news was especially exciting for me because as part of the breeding loan agreement with the zoo I received 50% of all the spiderlings which successfully moulted to this next life stage and on Monday 15th April 2012 I visited the zoo and collected 74 adorable little blue babies!  Here are just a couple of them:

News of Bristol zoo's success in breeding this fantastic species (with Smartie's help!) has been shared in many different settings, both online and in print, and even reached the national press as you can see here from the Daily Mail's article on April 30th 2012!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2137485/Incy-wincy-spider-tarantula-size-5p-coin-hatches-time-Bristol-Zoo.html

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

When I purchased Smartie in early October 2010 he was himself just a few weeks old and therefore at this same life stage, having hatched in late August 2010.  This is how small he was when I bought him, sitting in between the joints of my index finger!

He looked absolutely amazing during his development as you can see from the pictures below, because this species is always a bright metallic turquoise colour during the early months of life!

In my opinion this species is one of the most beautiful in the world, both as turquoise juveniles and as multi-coloured adults.  As adults the carapace (head area) is blue/green, the abdomen is covered in bright red hairs and the blue/green legs are covered in thick fluffy purple & pink hairs as you can see in the adult pictures of Smartie at the top of the page, hence why the name Smartie is so appropriate. 

You can see exactly how much Smartie grew (and changed colour) in the eleven months from when I bought him to the final moult by comparing the two pictures below, the left taken on October 2nd 2010 and the right taken on September 4th 2011! 

Like all spiders Smartie has had to moult his exoskeleton regularly as he was growing, and below you can see the scene which greeted me the morning after his moult in April 2011 (the 5th since I had bought him), with the real Smartie being on the right of the picture and his empty exoskeleton 0r exuvia (which was the last of the really turquoise ones) on the left hand side! 

The pictures below are of the empty exuvia from Smartie's final moult (the 7th since I bought him) in September 2011.  As you can see even this is cute, because quite simply everything about this beautiful spider is! 

Here are the undersides of his last two exuvia, showing the black fangs and also the huge size of his foot pads, which can be used to stick to any surface including glass.

I have quite a collection of Smartie's exuviae now that he has moulted seven times in just under eleven months.  When you line up the most recent four it is amazing to see just how much he has grown in such a short time!  Sadly these exuviae are very fragile indeed and because I handle them regularly to show children in schools etc. they unfortunately frequently lose limbs, hence why the older ones are looking a bit 'legless'!

It was an absolute pleasure and a delight to watch Smartie grow and change colour since purchasing him as a baby in October 2010 and he will be sorely missed by me when he is gone.  He has also consistently been the animal in my collection which I have received the most comments about, both from people I meet (adults & children) and also via my Facebook page where I have regularly added pictures of him along with many of my other animals.  Even many people who are quite fearful of spiders have talked or written to me about how they can appreciate his beauty, something I have really enjoyed.  He is one very special spider!

In October 2011, months before Smartie's breeding loan success at Bristol Zoo, I purchased three new babies of this wonderful species so that the cycle could start all over again!  Here are some pictures of these ones during their own development, hopefully at least one of them will turn out to be female this time around!