Most people think of disease causing germs when they think of bacteria and other microorganisms.  In reality, a very small minority or microbes are pathogenic, that is they can cause disease in man, animals or plants.  The truth is we and all living things are immersed in a fluid of air and live on a planet surface teaming with billions of minute organisms that can not be seen without a microscope.  More than 99% of these organisms are to our benefit; they protect us from disease causing bacteria, help digest our food, fix nitrogen in the soil, produce the oxygen we breath, clean up the environment in ways too numerous to mention.

This is true, not only of people, but of all living things including the spiders.  While the normal resident microbes, called the "normal flora," of man and most domestic animals have been well studied, that is not the case with most beneficial arthropods and especially true of the Tarantula.

We need to understand the normal flora of Tarantulas so that we can understand what is normal and what causes disease in these creatures.  In this way when diagnostic tests are made on a sick Tarantula, we can know whether a recovered, or "cultured," organism is the cause of the disease or simply a normal resident.  This is also important in understanding what antibiotic or other remedies to use; a drug that kills the normal flora may expose the Tarantula to even worse infections from competing organisms.

To do this we want to find out what organisms constitute the normal flora of the twelve most common captive Tarantulas: 1. Grammostola rosea 2. Aphonopelma seemanni 3. Avicularia avicularia 4. Brachypelma albopilosum 5. Theraphosa blondi 6. Grammostola pulchra 7. Brachypelma smithi 8. Eupalaestrus campestratus 9. Pterinochilus murinus 10. Citharischius crawshayi 11. Haplopelma lividum 12. Poecilotheria regalis. As we learn more we hope to expand the study to other species and to wild living Tarantulas as well.

The Institute and its cooperating laboratories will provide the necessary supplies for you to collect specimens for this study.  It is important that specimens from a wide variety of habitats in various parts of the world be studied so that we can determine the range and variation of normal flora in a variety of environments.
We sincerely hope all Tarantula enthusiasts will want to participate in this important project.  Members of the Institute plan to attend Tarantula group meetings to discuss this project and to demonstrate methods for collecting study specimens.

We have selected a self-contained swab and Amies Culture medium package made by Copan for use in this project.  The Copan swab is designed to protect both air loving (aerobic) and air hating (anaerobic) microorganisms during transportation to the laboratory and to prevent overgrowth of any fast multiplying organisms.  The microbiology laboratory that will provide a donation of the initial bacteriology services is Parabola Laboratory Services of Arlington, WA.

It is very important that specimens be collected in a standardized manner to allow comparison of the results from one location to another.  Selection of the collection methods is very arbitrary and is designed for simplicity. 

A standardized kit will be provided for collecting samples from a single animal.  The kit consists of five Copan Amies Agar Culture and transportation tubes and a single small sterile amber vial.

Being extremely careful to avoid touching the swab or stick to anything, lightly swab (or roll) the cotton tipped applicator over the area to be studied and then push the tip into the jelled culture medium.  Be sure to label the culture swab.

Swab the following arias, each with a separate swab.

1. The upper, dorsal, surface of the carapace and abdomen.
2. The lower, ventral, surface of the carapace and abdomen.
3. The mouthparts being careful to capture some gastric fluid, at the end of a meal.
4. The book lungs.
5. The fang with excreted venom if possible.

With a tweezers collect as many fecal droppings as possible and place in the small amber vial.

Please ship these specimens with a standard ice pack in a Styrofoam box using overnight Express Mail - Express Mail is the Postal Service overnight system and is the least expensive of the overnight services.  Naturally other services can be used if preferred.

Collect and mail your specimens to assure that the package arrives at the laboratory on Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday.  The address for the lab is:

Parabola Laboratory Services
307 North Olympic Ave
Suite 209
Arlington, WA 98223

If there are problems you may contact the lab at (360) 435-5540 or 360-435-5540 or by cell phone at 206-795-5124.

In general collect as much material as is available.  The same Copan swabs used in the normal flora collections are excellent for collecting material for diagnostic culture. Swab pus, haemolymph, and fluids with the cotton tipped applicator and place deeply into the jell culture medium.  Carefully scrap dry lesions or scabby type material and pick them up with the swab and place them in the culture jell.  If parasites are present or if a portion of the animal falls or breaks off place those solid specimens in small bottles of rubbing alcohol.  Request a biopsy bottle from either lab and when you receive the biopsy bottle transfer the specimen(s) from the alcohol to the biopsy bottle containing formalin.  (Note formalin as a poison and a skin irritant.)

If a Tarantula dies or must be euthanised you may request an autopsy and related microbiological studies by contacting Kerry Gowin at her laboratory in Justin Texas.

For requested autopsy on tarantulas time is of the essence to ensure proper dissection procedure and collection of material for diagnostic purposes. Ideally the specimen needs to be kept cold and shipped overnight with accompanying cold pack within 24 hours from the time of death. Another alternative method is to put the entire specimen into a bottle with at least 70% isopropyl alcohol or formalin and shipped out immediately. Autopsy photographs, some microscopic, will be taken and supplied to the donor if requested. Please note that microscopic photographs of tarantulas work best if the specimen is relatively dry. Due to the refractive nature of alcohol and formalin and its collection on the many hairs of the tarantula, photography is at times difficult.