As you may know, I recently got a Aphonopelma chalcodes sling, which I named Blinky. This little Arizona blonde is still fairly new to me, as I only got them toward the end of last year – so you can imagine the surprises only continue to roll in!

My little Aphonopelma chalcodes was not only first experience with another species of tarantula since I’d spent years taking care of my lone adult Grammostola rosea Spidey, but my first time raising a sling as well. That has been super fun and interesting to learn about, because unlike Spidey who is slow and fasts most of the time, Blinky is lightning fast and is ALWAYS ready to hunt and eat a cricket! But something I WILL say is that this little spider has some REALLY weird habits, which I’m going to be talking about in its post – some of which make me really wonder what the hell is going on in that little spider brain lol.

So first, one of the biggest differences between my little Aphonopelma chalcodes and my G. rosea is the fact that Blinky actually burrows. Like, a lot. While Spidey will go through phases where she will move a ton of dirt around and dig ditches in her substrate, she’s not very good at the whole “burrowing” thing. I’ve heard that some rose hairs actually do tunnel, but she’s not one of them lol. Now, Spidey has made some wannabe tunnels in her life, but they always tended to collapse on themselves (or she HERSELF ruined them) before they actually started to take shape. Blinky on the other hand, is a MASTER of tunneling and has constructed several elaborate mazes in its dirt to make a secret lair in which to capture its prey. Even though it is a baby, this tarantula could seriously teach Spidey a thing or two about tarantula-ing lol. And while that’s super impressive, there’s this OTHER thing that Blinky does that I CANNOT figure out for the life of me – and it has to do with eating.

My Aphonopelma chalcodes likes to soak its crickets.

Like, seriously. I have no idea what the hell its motivation is for this, but it’s happened more than once so it’s A THING. The first time I noticed this I was completely stunned. I was observing Blinky walking around its little deli cup enclosure with a cricket in its mouth, like a dog with a bone. This is very cute and a common thing Blinky does. But then, I saw Blinky walking toward its water dish, and even walking through the water with the cricket. I thought perhaps this spider might have just made a mistake, but then this sling turned around and did it again. And again. What in the fresh hell kind of eating strategy is this?!

Anyway, this happened several times. Some people weighed in on Tumblr, suggesting this A. chalcodes wanted to wash its food or soak it before eating lol. It was certainly a sight to behold, and one I wish I’d gotten a video of. Anyway, my spiders are always doing strange things so I quickly forgot about it. Until… it happened again recently.

Once again, I witnessed Blinky taking its cricket, going over to its water dish and giving it a nice hearty soak!

This time, Blinky didn’t walk through the water dish repeatedly, it just held the cricket in the water forever lol. Once I posted the news on Tumblr, people were making all kinds of jokes about Blinky being a chef and wanting to “marinate” its food!

I think this behavior is absolutely adorable and I can’t wait to capture more of these hilarious moments – but at the same time I’d love to know WHY this little Arizona blonde is doing this! I’ll continue to observe this strange little spider and hopefully one day I will have the answer. Has anyone else noticed such weird, random behavior from the Aphonopelma chalcodes or any other spider?! Let me know!

And by the way, if you want to learn more about the Aphonopelma chalcodes and how to care for them, check out my guide here.