Tarantula — Just a Cute Little Kid and A Sign Of Spring

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Our weather in southern Arizona has been spring-like for the past couple of weeks. There is a lot of plant and animal activity that reflects the changing seasons. Birds are migrating and plants are putting out shoots and leaves.

I was inspecting the foliage in our backyard yesterday afternoon when another likely sign of spring caught my eye. I saw a tarantula strolling across our back patio.

We have at least three resident tarantulas in our yard. These huge burrow-dwelling spiders become dormant during the autumn and winter months. They plug up their burrows and wait for warm weather. The first sign of resumed activity by these tarantulas will be the opening of their burrow entrances. That hasn’t happened yet.

Tarantulas are nocturnal creatures. One almost never sees one in the daytime and one almost never sees a tarantula more than a meter or so away from its burrow entrance (except that adult males will wander in search of mates during the breeding season, from late July through early September).

So, what was this individual doing on our patio in broad daylight, especially given that the resident adult tarantulas all still seem to be dormant? The answer, I suspect, is that this is a very young tarantula, just a kid, in fact.

An adult Desert Blonde Tarantula — the dominant local species — grows to about three inches in length. Add its leg span and you have a creature that is about five inches in diameter. This individual was barely an inch long. As a point of reference, the yellow leaf in these images is about the size of a penny.

I’ve been told that very young tarantulas are nomadic. They spend their early lives wandering around, hiding under rocks or bits of detritus, like fallen leaves, during the day, hunting at night. It’s not until they reach a certain size that they dig burrows, which will become their homes for the rest of their lives.

Now, it is possible that this little tarantula is a different species from our local Desert Blonde, perhaps something that is mature but very small. I doubt it. Not only does it look exactly like a Desert Blonde Tarantula, but sightings of other species in our area aren’t common. So, I’ll stick with the hypothesis that this is a very young Desert Blonde Tarantula that just happened to be out wandering when I found it. It had undoubtedly been stirred by our recent warm weather and was looking for a safe hiding place.

I left the spider alone after I photographed it. I returned a half-hour later to check on its presence and it was gone, no doubt having wandered off our patio and into our yard. There, it most likely found a hiding place under one of the plants and shrubs. With luck I’ll see this spider again some day, after it has matured and dug a burrow.

Images made with a Canon 5DS-R, Canon EF 180mm f3.5L Macro Lens, illuminated by Canon Ringlite, M setting, ISO 100, f16 @ 1/160.