There are many different ways to separate the different kinds of tarantulas into how we both describe them and how their care differs. Whether it be New or Old World, which means from the Americas or not, or how different species, genera or families act. Tarantulas also differ on where they like to spend their lives, if that’s up a tree, chilling on the ground or tucked up in a burrow. Each of those types of tarantulas have different requirements and act differently.
Animals that spend most of their lives in the trees are known as arboreal. Arboreal tarantulas cannot be kept like their ground dwelling terrestrial counterparts.
First of all, arboreal tarantulas tend to be a lot more flighty than terrestrial tarantulas. Arboreal tarantulas also tend to be more venomous, although still remember that nobody has died from a tarantula bite in recorded history, however many, especially the old world arboreals, can have venom that is considered the strongest among tarantulas and a bite from one of these can be medically significant. That is why I personally would not recommend an arboreal to anyone who has never owned a tarantula before to go out and get one.
The two most well known genera of arboreal tarantulas would be Poecilotheria and Avicularia. These species are very attractive on the eye and come in a variety of colours, this however has placed many of these species in danger of disappearing from the wild due to illegal poaching for the pet trade.
If you are keeping an arboreal tarantula, the common sense thing to do would be to keep them in an enclosure that has more height to it than other tarantulas would need. Apart from this, the setup is pretty much the same apart from replacing a ground hide to a piece of bark or hollow log that they can retreat into.
I personally own a few arboreal tarantulas, I have kept more in the past but they have sadly passed away. A communal set of five Indian Ornamental tarantulas (Poecilotheria regalis), plus a large Gooty Ornamental (Poecilotheria metallica) as well as a Wessel’s Tiger Ornamental (Poecilotheria tigrinawesseli) are the arboreal tarantulas that I currently have now. I have noticed that with all arboreal tarantulas, the poo gets everywhere.
