Do Tarantulas Jump? And Is it Species Specific?
It doesn’t matter whether you’re a happy tarantula pet owner, or if you just found a tarantula in your house and you need to get it out.
Whenever you encounter a tarantula, it’s good to know if tarantula’s can jump…
So, do they?
Typically tarantulas don’t jump. But in some cases, they might.
Even though tarantulas may leap a couple of centimetres when trying to catch prey, falling can severely and lethally hurt tarantulas. For this reason alone it would be a very rare occurrence to be the whiteness of a tarantula jumping.
But can tarantulas jump, if they really needed to? It turns out, some species of tarantulas can. Especially those living in arboreal habitats. And it’ll surprise you how high they can actually jump.
Depending on the species, tarantulas can jump anywhere from 1 inch to as much as 2 feet high or, reportedly, even higher.
Which species of tarantulas jump?
The South-American arboreal species Avicularia avicularia, or the “pink toe”, can jump. Actually, any Avicularia can jump, but other species of tarantulas can jump as well, including the:
- Acanthoscurria geniculata
- Lampropelma
- Lasiodora
- Omothymus
- Poecilotheria
- Psalmopoeus
- Stromatopelma calceatum
- Tapinauchenius
While all tarantulas can perform something that could be classified as a pounce or leap, true jumping is usually only attributed to the arboreal species.
Keep in mind that even for arboreal Tarantula species jumping involves great risks. They haven’t evolved claws for nothing: being able to stick to the tree is of life saving importance to them. This is the reason that tarantulas only jump as a means of a last resort. It is very likely that you will never get to see your tarantula jumping. But it is good to keep in mind that it is in fact a possibility when you handle your tarantula.
Can tarantulas survive falls?
Yes they can, but the higher the falling distance the higher the chance the tarantula gets injured or takes lethal damage. The fact that they can survive falling, doesn’t mean that they always will, let alone that you should put your tarantula in a situation where it might fall.
Tarantulas are a heavy class of spiders and although they are strong, they’re really fragile as well. So keep your handling of tarantulas to the bare minimum and whenever you do handle your tarantula, make sure the risk of it falling or jumping off is minimal.
How high do tarantulas jump?
Because jumping tarantulas are so seldomly sighted, we don’t have enough data to decisively give an upper limit of how high tarantulas can jump.
However, there are a couple of things to be said here, amongst which the accounts of eyewitnesses.
First of all, there’s the leap for pray that could be classified as jumping.
Any animal capable of explosive movements is able to jump at least a small distance, and tarantulas are classified as such. Any tarantula is therefore capable of lifting itself at least an inch off the ground when attacking prey.
There’s many accounts and videos of tarantulas jumping about a foot high. Vertical distances can even be further.
Some accounts, however go as far as to say that some species can easily jump two feet!
Do pet tarantulas jump?
While there isn’t a biological difference between wild tarantulas and pet tarantulas, there may be a small variation in the behavior between the two. This includes the frequency with which tarantulas jump as well.
Pet tarantulas are often a bit more docile than wild tarantulas. Tarantulas that have been lavishly fed, for example, might have less need to jump toward prey than a starving tarantula in the wild would.
Similarly, while arboreal tarantulas in the wild may jump relatively often because the terrain and other circumstances such as the presence of predators may entice the tarantula to jump, such circumstances occur less in captivity. As a result, pet tarantulas are recorded to jump less often than tarantulas in the wild.
Keep in mind that although pet tarantulas may jump less, this does not mean that they won’t jump at all. Like I said, the chances that you see your tarantula jump are slim, but don’t get taken by surprise. Always account for the possibility that your tarantula could jump, especially when it’s an arboreal species like some of those listed above.
The Bottom Line
So in conclusion, tarantulas can jump anywhere from 1 inch to about 20, 25 inches. Only arboreal species will be able to jump as high as the upper limit of this range.
While most tarantulas can jump, they seldomly do so. This is because jumping can be fatal to tarantulas, and so they only jump significant distances in case of an emergency.
