Walau...more incredible clips from u! The fight btw Valor and Darkmatter really gruesome. Can see Darkmatter from 18-22 already got badly injured by Valor's attack but mistake by Darkmatter as not wanting to run away. At 30, DM still got chance to run away to go under the platform but unfortunately still want to fight despite being injured. 36 already can see DM trying to escape but too injured leow. From 43 onwards technically it is no longer a fight but waiting for death! Ur pushnig allow DM to escape in the end, but half dead leow. Hope it will survive. Valor damn fierce man, remind me of ur Hope.

Valor vs Giga also good match. Never see before fs being throw so far away, somemore face the other side. Cannot see how Giga got thrown...somehow looks like he got catapulted away.

Thanks for sharing. So now ur first king is Valor?

Haolao! Cacardon knocked out! Wat happened to Megadon? Still around?

Wah...Terminator and Robocop clean sweep. 1st and 2nd king now in Singapore??

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Added on June 20, 2009, 10:21 pmKsiao : Welcome, we are happy that anyone join in fs catching and fighting fun!

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Added on June 20, 2009, 10:32 pmI doubt can find any wild fighting fish in singapore. Even in Malaysia also very difficult, maybe only in the northern part of Malaysia in padi fields, their species known as betta imbellis. Besides, even for betta splendens/smaragdina, the wild ones only fight probably 15mins or so. It is the bred ones that are bred to last long in fights.

This post has been edited by mindstorm: Jun 20 2009, 10:32 PM

wat is CB trees?

Wah if u guys fight fs in McDonalds, must take some pics leh...haha!

ok, just doing some reporting for the record. Oldguy still alive and with quite a full tummy too. Took him out from his nest just now at night and took some pics of him. He is still capable of jumping far(as evident by the first pic where he was just jumping onto my camera) and climbing up his own web. Still very much healthy apart from the fact he can no longer hang on to vertical plastic surface like those of my vials. 4 months 3 weeks leow. Judging from his fitness level, i'm not surprised if he can live longer than 5 months after last moult. After photosession i let him back in a nest on my plants. Hope to be able to find him again in July.

haha! i think no one active here from penang. I'm from klang valley and so is viper. Mangroove jumper from the US. The rest from Singapore. But u're welcome to share ur stories or pics and clips if u still play with them. We'll all love to see them.

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Added on June 26, 2009, 12:25 amSome years back i was keeping a first king when he started to rub fangs quite frequently(after frequent fighting and eating housefly), 1 week later it died. I guess prolonged fang rubbing maybe a sign that the fs may have gotten some infection around the mouth area. Who knows? Unless someone is scientist enough to see with microscope. Prolonged rubbing is different from just a short rub after being wet or eating an acidic ant. The latter is harmless while the former is, like Bro Trevally said, not good sign to me too.

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Added on June 26, 2009, 12:33 amDefinately aggresive, mostly coming from the suppao...but at last it retreated after losing its stamina. 2nd king defended quite well but not aggressive enuf to chase after suppao to finish him off.

This post has been edited by mindstorm: Jun 26 2009, 12:33 AM

Wah...sure or not wor? Sorry guys but unless I see picture, I must say I'm skeptical of that claim. Seems exagerated because Cacadon itself is already so big.
I hope someone can take close-up pic of Terminator's head against a 1mm grid paper(can buy from any book store, make sure not 2mm)just like wat i did here(i showed this with a write up in page 6 of this forum)

That way we can have record of the largest FS sizes and compare them.

This post has been edited by mindstorm: Jun 26 2009, 12:54 AM

TERRIFIC MATCH between Terminator and Robocop!! Terminator did a great job in defending the aggressive robocop. Can see terminator was holding pretty steady all the while except during 23-24 when he nearly got overturned by Robocop. Robocop all the time attacking from below as if trying to lift Terminator.

Noticed Robocop got an interesting stance right at the beginning, with "forearms" placed somewhat forward. He is a koppao but yet display stance in the beginning, infact go-stanning a bit also. His forward rush also in a stance position. If you stop at 12, can clearly see that Robocop actually launched a flank attack for his first kop. Lucky for Terminator, Robocop did not secure a bite on base of the arm or it could have come off! In the end, Terminator still has the slight advantage of size over Robocop to fend him off. Clash of 2 titans lasted a good 30s.

Both titans seems to be at their prime, well-kept and very alert.
Kudos to Kenz.

Beautiful take too. Nice big leaf for a platform and both fs fought in the middle. Clear lighting.
Thanks for the upload, BTL.

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Added on June 30, 2009, 2:32 amJust want to ask...i remember Terminator lost to Bro Koppao's fs last time. Bro Koppao, what happened to that large fs of urs?

This post has been edited by mindstorm: Jun 30 2009, 02:38 AM

i must say best video of all time is caca vs robo. close and clear and long match btw 2 kings. Thanks very much to koppao for taking the trouble to unload the video...FINALLY! (i commented in youtube)
wah u guys in singapore have so much fs, i also hard to remember whose is whose. Tony is whose one?

i see u guys also begining to build natural homes for fs. Great man! Fs can excercise more.

Just some reporting. Oldguy died on the 2nd July. Died in a container i kept him in. I can safely say he lived for 5 months after last moult. Never thought fs can live so long. But because he hardly fight.

Anyway i have a sling who reached 4th instar leow! FULLY CAPTIVE raised from 1st instar(after hatching). Later will show some pics. This is just to prove something. It is NOT IMPOSSIBLE to raise fs in captive! Cheers!!

Instar refers to stage in between moults.

As FS grows, they need to change skin mah, cuz the skin can stretch only until certain size.

When first hatch from egg, we call the slings 1st instar. After 1st moult, then become 2nd instar lor and so on.

Last time i had a discussion with one lady researcher from NUS(can see in this forum, some past pages) who also tried to raise fs in captivity but she failed to raised them beyond 2nd instar. Meaning, her slings did go through 1st moult but died before having 2nd moult.
I too tried many times to raise but failed. But this time, a breaktrough has come and 2nd instar is no longer a limit.
Now my goal is to see how many moults a fs takes to reach adulthood and roughly how long.

hua, this is one of the most violent and messy fight i have ever seen.
Very good fight even though not very long. Seems both of them injured their arms?
He looks finished after fighting Jong...

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Added on July 29, 2009, 2:49 am
Yo, nice to to see sg fs team getting more and more members..jong71, alex31 and fsnow55.(why all end with number? got meaning one ah? age?)
I thought all along the sg bros have been trying to rank their fs. But sure to be a bit messy, since kings come and go..
An official tournament and league system would be interesting but i think a lot of the ranking of current fs would already be known since you all have been quite actively fighting them. But if there is to be one, chipping in by each participant as registration fees for some prizes for the winner(s) would make the whole event more enjoyable.
Who knows? If the prizes is attractive enuf, u may suddenly get some quiet unknowns suddenly showing up for the challenge..

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Added on July 29, 2009, 2:55 amI always have some crazy ideas. One of them i have all along but never get around to do is to preserve the passed- away kings in a glamourous way. Sort of put them in a fighting stance and preserve them in a clear resin like how they make insect jewellery. In that way, you will always be able to eyeball compare sizes of kings from different generations.

http://www.ehow.com/how_5003475_make-insect-jewelry.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pnr21sjV2g&feature=related



This post has been edited by mindstorm: Jul 29 2009, 03:07 AM

this must be the weirdness story i have heard about fs. I would understand if they are slings. But s-m size? 10? walau.

Personally, i don't have any impression of catching 2 males one nest. Maybe i did, but i don't remember it at all. It must be a big nest if that is the case. I doubt fs understand wat is brotherhood about. I have been rearing slings on and off recently and i can tell u this. After a few days after hatching, the slings would separate and should they meet, they will square off! With stance and all. And not uncommonly, one of them can even launch a chop!(You can try that yourselves, catch some similar slings and fight them!) They are born to fight!

But i wouldn't deny the possibility that some offsprings may somehow acquire tolerence shld they be "forced"(for lack of better choice) to grow inside the same nest. Just like fighting fish. I have seen my friend reared about 30-40 adult males fighters in one large tank since they are fries. Now and then a couple may flare up but otherwise they seems like females in a tank. So it is possible that may be the case with "brother" fs.

The brother fs i talked about very early in this forum(bro1 and bro2) were not caught in same nest. They were caught while still in the stage before the last moult(black face) and because they both moulted exactly the SAME night, i ASSUME they are brothers. Also because they were nearly same size and pattern and caught in nest that were quite closeby. Now come to think of it, it must be terribly coincidental that 2 brother fs can moult exactly the same time for ALL the number of moults until the last one.

I found that slings can moult exactly the same day for the first moult but got also a few days apart. But overall this shows that the cycle can be fairly predictable, means the cycle fall within a small range of deviation, provided they are not starved or diseased i suppose.

This post has been edited by mindstorm: Jul 29 2009, 03:21 AM

Here is something interesting i noticed. After a moult, the sling actually would suck on its moulted skin.(I've seen it several times). This i think is the 3rd instar. It seems they maybe getting some nutrients left in their moulted skin and so as not to waste it, they would suck on it.

Lalang looks potent now after becoming chop. How long u keep him leow?

Gila vs Lalang Rd2

WALAN EH. Underside attack/troat bite or watever u call it...this is another first ONE OF ITS KIND fight variation. A sudden strong jerk push from gila at 0.41 flipped lalang upside down and amazingly gila still standing upright which allowed it to have a deadly point of attack. Notice at 0.40-0.41 both arms of lalang is wide open. At 0.39 just b4 the flip, lalang's right arm is held away...maybe that's why the flip can happen. Lalang was not holding on to its opponent tight enuf... Probably Lalang already weaken also. After the roll about in the first 6 seconds, can see Lalang already injured. Heck man, Gila really aggressive and gila too. Perfect choice of name man!
Good that the brothers there then also try to stop the match, at least saved Lalang. (But even the attempt to save Lalang was incredible! Despite whoever was that tapping hard underneath the leaf to break up Gila's stronghold, Gila was still holding on to its victim like mad!)

I can understand moderator Nairud's concern about death matches. I think this is a very controversial issue and surely different brothers here will have different viewpoints which are valid. Actually from many of the fights clips, we can see that most of the time,whenever there an impeding death match, there will be someone who would try to stop the match. Sometimes it happen so fast and unexpectedly that hardly anything can be done. Afterall they are spiders and spiders can deliver a fatal bite to kill their prey(including other spiders) in a split second. But most of the time, maybe we also unsure wheather a hold would lead to death or not cuz sometimes the fs being held can turn around to counter.

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Added on August 13, 2009, 2:19 amYeah, kudos to ur blog! I think thanks to internet, this hobby will never die out and always be remembered and hopefully lived on. If you want, you are of cuz free to use any content too from me which i post almost all in this tread, maybe for rediscussion or watever. I am happy we now have so many enthusiasts from Singapore to continue to liven this hobby.

Bro Jong71, I too also have this concern that this forum might one day not approve our content or one day take down this tread for watever reason. Hence, I actually save almost all the pages whenever i have the time!! haha! In case one day, computer harddisk crash or watever, I can shift all this to another website/forum/blog! so that we all still can continue the fs hobby. Now that Trevally got his own blog, in case this happen then we all jump to his blog!(Trevally then will have quite a bit of work to put up the now 100+ post from this tread if he agree to it!)
I guess forum tread allows the contributors more power to load up their own content to contribute but blog content mainly must go through the blog owner before you can see it. Is that correct, trevally? cuz i also not sure about blogging. But i guess google blog allows more freedom for the type of content, while forum got moderator(police) to check check on us. i guess for blog the police is the blogger himself.

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Added on August 13, 2009, 2:25 amhaha, of cuz i still reading this tread!
Since u said this but already so big, i assume adult leow so I think no chance this bu will ever moult let alone moult to Kang. Hmm... could this be another species like the one Viper gave me? can u show us a pic of it from the top, showing its abdomen pattern also?

This post has been edited by mindstorm: Aug 13 2009, 03:57 AM

wow, i think you guys just set another record... largest fighting spider hunting group!! (and elders too i suppose...) As far as i can remember even back in the 80s i don't remember seeing more than 5 fellas hunting together, usually only 3-4 at most. so nine people is definately the most i know of. (i remember there was another group hunting last year by a group from arofanatics but can't remember how many went).

Special thanks to jong71 for your interesting report and BTL for the clips and group photo! It's a pleasure to see so many fs kakis together

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Added on October 2, 2009, 1:25 amsince i suddenly reappear after being MIA for some time, i'll just do some reporting too. Not much and nothing to do with fighting but i do have a couple of new facts regarding their biology.

To date i have reared more than 10 fs past 2nd instar but even after that, the growing fs can still die with unknown reason. Since i last posted abt growing fs, i had this sling which was eating very vorociously and growing really fast compared to its siblings. I was banked on being the first to know how fast possibly does it take for a fs to reach adulthood from hatching/coming out of the nest. UNFORTUNATELY when it reached 6th instar, after i changed it to a new container, i didn't realize there was a tiny opening in the container. F***, one afternoon i came out and it was torned up by ANTS. i squished every ant in the container i found. Pretty sad day for me.

Anyway, by 6 instar it was already the size of a small adult and i could see that it was most probably a female.
here are the dates i joted down

18th may - hatched
(21 days as 1st instar)
7th june - 1st moult
(11 days as 2nd instar)
18th june - 2nd moult
(21 days as 3rd instar)
9th july - 3rd moult
(11 days as 4th instar)
20th july - 4th moult
(16 days as 5th instar)
5th aug - 5th moult ..........approximately 2 and a half months old
..kept for a couple more days as 6th instar b4 being lunch for ants

this fella was the fastest growing one, and i figured that given another moult or 2 it would be adult. Meaning fs can possibly turn to adult as soon as 3 and half months or 4 months since hatching.
Notice the time in between moults alternate between longer and shorter time...21,11,21,11,16 days.
I also notice it grew really fast during its 3rd instar and 6th instar(even that short few days)...which is during the longer in-between moult period. Contrary to what i read and thought that spiders only grow right after moulting(maybe that few hours after moulthing or day to expand), i realized it wasn't the case for fs. They can grow rapidly for many days in-between moults. But i do notice that once they start to turn black, they probably stop growing and will moult soon.

Anyway there was another of its siblings which was living among the plants and it took probably twice the time to reach the same size as this fast growing fella. Which i think on a more average rate, fs probably will take 4-6 months to reach adulthood judging from the range of rate of growth i know so far. And if we take that fs can live for maybe 3-5 months after the last moult, we can postulate that on the whole, the lifespan of fs is probably 9 months to a year at most?

Hopefully we will know the truth soon, as i still have 2 slings(out of 8) from another batch already at their 5th instar(hatch out from nest on 4th August) which is also quite fast growing(but not as fast as the first one). And i "think" both are male. Last previous moult was 28th Sept. I will get a pic of them on grid paper maybe the day after tomorrow(tom really busy).

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Added on October 2, 2009, 1:33 amone more thing... i noted that some time ago, some of u posted ur fs on grid paper. i so wanted to compare the sizes but unfortunately(again) i already uninstalled that huge photoshop software from my comp which was taking up a lot of space which my old comp doesnt have. so i couldn't play around with the pics.

i wonder any of u happened to have a copy of image composer 1.3. It is a discontinued graphic software from microsoft which came with frontpage 2000 i think. It is one of the best simply software for graphic manipulation, would be perfect to compare fs sizes on grid, better than having a bloated photoshop. i lost mine after a friend didnt return my cd copy. Can't seem find it in cd stores nowadays.

This post has been edited by mindstorm: Oct 2 2009, 01:41 AM

thanks. i've been curious about everything regarding fs since long long time.
i should think they have to go through many moults since they are really really tiny as new born.
nope, i didn't do any selection this time. i just got the eggs laid on my plants from a female which i caught pregnant.
i started this tread with "strongest and biggest male" breeding in mind, but due to the numerous problems of fs mating, egg brooding and rearing, i guess i was forced to overcome the problems one at a time. right now the focus is on getting at least just one fs to adulthood.

certainly i believe in the genetics of fs. genetics applies to all living creatures. it is either natural selection or human selection that can result in the traits of an animal. and the fs traits we desire is bigger, stronger and fiercer!

i should think so. it has been proven without doubt in other fighting animals... dog, cock, plakat eg eg
i am apt to think so too...because females seems to be more greedy and less fussy about food!
but unless we have a larger study, we can't conclude for sure. but over time if i can continue to raise fs slings, then no doubt, in time, we will know for sure.

yes, as most of us here should know(if u ever attempt to mate fs), it is extremely difficult or almost impossible to get males to mate with matured females, more so if the female is large, and esp if it is pregnant with eggs. through observation both in the wild and from the talk i had with a nus researcher last year...i think that it is possible that males may be able to mate with sub-adult females just before they moult OR males may seek out sub-adult females and stay with them until the female moult, and then mate with the female at the first sign of readiness. that would most probably be how fs mate despite we finding it almost impossible to mate a male and female.

yeah, bro trevally, i like ur blog too. one good thing about blog is that u can categorize topics unlike this forum when information comes in a chronological way. after a while it becomes difficult to find back certain information in a forum.

on a side note, i realized the links to the activities last year from the guys from arofanatics are all gone...the conversations, the photos and the fight competition clips. so sad. i should have saved them too..but i didn't. on the contrary, this link started by viper in lowyat in 2007
http://forum.lowyat.net/topic/522060
still can be found!

...which reminds me i should be saving some of the recent pages here....just in case. hehe.

thanks

hoho!! u are my saviour! how big is the installer for image composer 1.3?
can u winzip(only for image composer) and email me? adrianlwkeat@gmail.com

if too big, can burn and send the cd to me?(if can i'll pm u my add) i'll pay for all cost.
or can pay u in fs too...haha!

with image composer 1.3, can do a whole lot of cool stuff with graphics easily.

ok here are some shots on tim and max. both came out from nest on 4th August. Both now in 5th instar.
Notice their pedipalps are rather thick...expected to be males.(if i'm correct, then it would mean by 5th instar can differentiate fs sex... i remember i couldn't tell in the previous instar)

Tim
-shortform for timid...timid is slightly smaller than max. He was extremely difficult to photograph, refusing to stay in the spotlight on the grid paper and keep jumping off. i think i must have exhausted it the first round until it began walking lethargically. only second round of photoshooting did it calm down a bit.


Max
-shortform for "maximum growth". Bigger and bolder than Tim. He stood under spotlight the first round looking around curiously.



Will max turn out to be like this???(in case for the clueless...this photo is the first photo found on the first page of this forum)


This post has been edited by mindstorm: Oct 5 2009, 11:28 PM

yeah, great pics from kenz691. One of the most close-up pics i've seen on fs.

But the most awesome macro pics i've come across on a jumping spider's face got to be from here...post 307#
http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread...t=38262&page=21
my eyes nearly popped out when i saw the Evarcha arcuata, adult male close up.
And the nymph!!

The results are out. Max moulted yesterday night and Tim just now...and they're both adult males. It took them a mere 2 months 10 days to reach adulthood from the day they left their nest. That's suprising fast. I guess there was no 6th instar stage which i thot the previous female i had was in. Apparently it was already adult. Hence, FS goes through 5 moults and 5 instar stages...after the 5th moult, they turn to adult. The previous female took about 2 and a half months to reach final moult. Very close to the time Tim and Max took. The 5th instar stage for Max was 15 days, and for Tim was 16 days. The previous female was 16 days. Again almost same. There u have it...

Max turned out to be medium size only while Tim is small sized. Guess they don't have the large genes.

Max



Tim...straight out of the oven



Exoskeletons. Max left, Tim right.

actually i'm assuming 2 months 10 days would be on the faster scale as the ones successfully reared up to adult were all the fastest growing ones since 2nd or 3rd instar. i doubt even in the wild would be very much faster.
Assuming the they 2-3 months of growing time and adult stage last 3-5 months(5 months is the longest recorded), you can see that the shortest theoretical lifespan(provided not killed by other means apart of old age), would be 5 months(2+3)(grow fast, die fast) and longest theoretical lifespan would be 8 months(3+5). Suppose we give it another month of subadult growing(4 months)(which is possible by eating less frequently), then the maximum theoretical lifespan would be only 9 months. Much less than what i approximated, which was 1 year.

Yes, by hunting them, you basically reduce their chance of breeding esp with bigger males, and hence there is less chance of having big males. Basically it also means their gene pool for large genes are being siphoned off.

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Added on October 18, 2009, 1:02 amAs i mentioned before, technically, the "females" that moulted to males were not females in the first place. They are actually males that look like females because they still have black faces. Now we know that in the 5th instar stage, even though it still have black face, we can distinguish male from female because for the males, the pedipalps are much thicker.

Once a fs male moulted its last moult and show a white face, that's it. It will not moult again and it won't grow bigger too. Yes, it means a small male fs won't be able to grow big(it terms of head size). Never ever in my entire fs experience have i seen it. Only the abdomen can grow fatter if u feed it alot.

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Added on October 18, 2009, 1:10 amThanks.

there u have it. once white face, they will never molt again.

Yes, it is not a matter of time but rather genes. Nutrition helps but for exceptional traits eg being larger, an animal need to be selected for their genes.

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Added on October 18, 2009, 1:26 amAnother suprising thing. I put Max and Tim together and Tim ran away when Max show angry face. Before changing to adult, I also have seen Max chasing Tim out of its nest. Just now i tried to put them 2 together, they were very close together when they suddenly saw each other... and Max straight CHOP at Tim. Walau, ONLY 2 days after moult already can chop. Must find other males to test out Max...

This post has been edited by mindstorm: Oct 18 2009, 01:26 AM