Bug card No. 0363 of 1,500
Costa Rican zebra tarantula
Aphonopelma seemanni
Eats: Other bugs and small animalsSpidersDeserts and dry places8 legsNot an insect, but a bug cousin
The Costa Rican zebra tarantula is a big, hairy black spider with white stripes at its knees, like a zebra. It lives in deep burrows in dry scrubland in Central America. It is shy and runs away very fast.
Fun fact: spiders are not insects. Insects have six legs, spiders have eight. Everyone calls them bugs anyway!
Lives in
Central America: Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras and maybe Guatemala, in dry scrubland
What does it eat?
It eats insects like grasshoppers and cockroaches. Pet tarantulas are fed crickets.
How fast is it?
A tortoise about 0.3 km/h (0.19 mph)
Costa Rican zebra tarantula about 1.5 km/h (0.93 mph)
A person walking about 5 km/h (3.1 mph)
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
With its legs spread out it measures about 10 to 13 centimetres.
2
A female can live up to 20 years. Males live only up to about five years.
3
Its deep burrow stays cool on hot days and warm on cold nights.
4
Lots of them often live close together in the same area.
5
Some are brown instead of black.
you asked
Most asked questions about Costa Rican zebra tarantula
?How long does a zebra tarantula live?
Females can live up to 20 years, males up to about five.
?What does a zebra tarantula eat?
Insects such as grasshoppers, cockroaches and crickets.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Aphonopelma seemanni
- Group
- Spiders
- Family
- Theraphosidae
- Classification
- Arachnida > Araneae > Theraphosidae
- Lives on
- North America
- Also known as
- Striped-knee tarantula
Where the facts come from
- Aphonopelma seemanni (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by https://www.flickr.com/photos/scragz/. CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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