Haven't seen my sling?

[HoneyBeeeHappy]

I'm used to this sort of thing - I have a burrowing snake, after all. Sometimes you just gotta assume its alive - if the food has been mysteriously disappearing, then it's probably alive.

Since Pumpkin died, I've been waiting to find another g. pulchripes sling on sale. I got one, and its smaller than mine was when she died. But it's still much bigger than Pumpkin was when I first got her - she was just over a week old and absolutely miniscule. Was never really interested in hiding though. I guess I just got used to Pumpkin's "personality" because this one is baffling me a little.

Haven't seen it since the day I put it in it's new enclosure. I tossed a tiny cricket in there in the hopes that it'd "disappear" and that would be my sign-of-life evidence. The cricket was alive for over a day, then it wedged itself between the plexi and cocofiber and I thought it'd died so I planned on removing it this morning(last hope was that it'd be eaten while I slept again, wasn't optimistic), but this morning it was gone. I've gently poked around and haven't been able to find it.

I hope it got eaten, but it might have just gone to ground under the sling's cork bark chip; This happened a few times with Pumpkin. The cricket might dart for the nearest hiding spot before she could pounce(which only made it easier for her ofc). The only difference is that it might be a safe hiding spot if the sling isn't alive to eat it. Originally I was pretty sure the new sling was alive because for the first two days or so I saw evidence of terraforming - it widened the burrow considerably. No web carpets though.
Not sure how to tell if it's alive now. I'll give it another cricket soon, but I'm going to feel really dumb(and sad ) if I learn I've just been sending crickets to starve to death in an empty burrow. I really hope its alive.

 

[m0lsx]

Personally, I have never worked out how to tell if my small slings are eating or not. I feed beheaded mealworms. So the mealworms stay on the surface & do not burrow. Occasionally a mealworm gets buried by a sling, which is great. But slings are so small, how do we tell if they are eating or not? As even if we use live food T's have such a habit of not eating for a variety of reasons. And added to that I occasionally find dead crickets in larger T's enclosures, so crickets vanishing is not a guarantee of them being eaten.

Like you, I just pop food in & hope. And given most slings do live, most of the time they are alive.

 

[Jeef]

I've actually seen mine eat.

I have a bunch of juvies that take crickets. In the process of catching them out of the bag they come in from the LPS, I end up with a few cricket drumsticks. I like giving those to my slings. Those are small enough that you can tell if they've been eaten or not. I also feed my slings half a meal worm. You can tell if those have been munched on a lot of the time as well. Perhaps portion size might be your answer?

All that said, I've moved water dishes and found live dubias and watered moss to have a b. lat come running out. I've also had a couple that either ignore or run from their crickets. Sometimes they are gone in the morning, sometimes they aren't. My thought process is, they are passing up food, so they aren't starving.

 

[meridannight]

With live feeders it's mostly obvious when they eat. And I have ended up with spiderlings that really go after their prey, so I usually see them chomping on a cricket a few hours after I throw them in there. Even if I don't see it, when the cricket disappears it's probably been eaten. And if not, then the spiderling must not have been hungry.

With prekilled prey for the tiniest spiderlings I also know when they've eaten, because mine actually crawl up on top of the prekilled prey items (e.g. dubia legs, mealworms) and just stay there on those things for a couple of hours or so. I think that means they're eating it. That, and the fact spiderlings are getting fatter. I always drop prekilled food in the exact same spot in their enclosures, and they know where to come to find it. They're smart enough.