#tarantula keeping

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You know what tripped me up pretty badly when I first started keeping tarantulas? 0.0.0 and what it meant. I know a lot of people get confused by this so I’m gonna share how I personally remember it! It’s a little morbid, but it works– I swear.

First of all if you’re not even sure what 0.0.0 is, it’s something people use to list the number of inverts (or reptiles, I’ve seen people use it for that as well) as well as their sex. So for example, I have four Ybyrapora diversipes and I know one of them is a female. The rest are unsexed. I have 0.1.3 Ybyrapora diversipes. Get it?

Now to explain it. The first zero equals males you have, the second zero equals females you have, and the third is for the as-of-yet-unsexed invertebrates. Here are some examples:

I have one male P. imperator scorpion – I have 1.0.0 P. imperator scorpion.
I have two female A. geniculata tarantulas – I have 0.2.0 A. geniculata tarantulas.
I have four unsexed P. subfusca tarantulas – I have 0.0.4 P. subfusca tarantulas.

Get the idea? For example, here is my current list of tarantulas:

0.2.0 – Acanthoscurria geniculata
0.0.7 – Caribena versicolor
0.1.0 – Chilobrachys sp. “Vietnam Blue”
0.0.2 – Chromatopelma cyaneopubescens
0.0.1 – Brachypelma albiceps
1.1.0 – Brachypelma auratum
0.1.0 – Grammostola iheringi
0.1.0 – Grammostola porteri
0.1.0 – Grammostola pulchra
0.1.0 – Grammostola pulchripes
0.0.1 – Hapalopus sp. Colombia Large
0.1.0 – Harpactira cafreriana
0.0.1 – Lasiodora klugi
0.0.1 – Lyrognathus giannisposatoi
0.0.2 – Monocentropus balfouri
0.0.1 – Ornithoctonus aureotibialis
0.0.3 – Pamphobeteus antinous
0.0.2 – Pamphobeteus sp. “Costa”
0.0.1 – Pamphobeteus sp. “Hexa”
0.0.1 – Pamphobeteus sp. “Insignis”
0.0.1 – Phormictopus cancerides
0.0.2 – Poecilotheria metallica
0.0.4 – Poecilotheria regalis
0.1.0 – Poecilotheria striata
0.0.4 – Poecilotheria subfusca
0.1.0 – Poecilotheria tigriniawesseli
0.0.2 – Psalmopoeus cambridgei
0.0.1 – Psalmopoeus irminia
0.0.1 – Psalmopoeus reduncus
0.0.1 – Neoholothele incei Gold
0.0.9 – Nhandu chromatus
0.0.1 – Nhandu tripepii
0.0.4 – Ybyrapora diversipes

It’s basically just a much easier way of listing your invertebrates. For example, if I told you that list again in layman’s terms it’d go something like:

Two female A. geniculata, seven unsexed C. versicolor, one female Chilobrachys sp. Vietnam Blue, two unsexed C. cyaneopubescens, one unsexed B. albiceps…

Get it? While the 0.0.0 system takes a bit to wrap your head around, it really is a much cleaner way of listing your Invertebrate collection.

NOW, as for the tip on how to remember which sex goes where? The first zero is for males, who typically die the soonest. The second zero is for females, who typically live longer than males. The third zero is the ‘miscellaneous’ column pretty much! If you haven’t confirmed your Ts sex, through them into the misc column until you know for sure what their sex is.

0.0.0 = MALE.FEMALE.UNSEXED – Hope this helps!