The Slice from PBS North.

Hey guys, I'm Dan and I am here with Rosie, our Chilean rose hair tarantula.

It means she comes from Chile and she's called a rose hair tarantula because in the certain light, her hairs, the hairs that cover her body actually glint with a reddish a rose like tinge to them.

But a lot of South American species have a very unique, colorful, bright tinge to them.

Some of them you can even find bright blues, cobalts, for example.

They can produce silk through their spinnerets, but they do not create a web.

They do not use their silk for hunting.

Rather, these guys are a burrowing species, so they like to use the silks to help put down a layer of support in their burrows in their homes to basically act as construction material.

Old world tarantulas from Europe, Africa, Asia are not hairy, but they will still be classified as tarantulas.

But new world ones do have these hairs.

They serve a number of different purposes.

They use their hairs as a sensory organ that can help pick up vibrations.

So those hairs will act like antenna and help them feel out their environment, feel out other animals that may be in the vicinity.

Because these are such a popular pet species, we always like to say here at the zoo, if that is something you interested in, you do have to do your research because there's a lot of specialized care that goes into these guys, a lot of knowledge of knowing how to care for them, how much of a danger they could potentially be to you as a human.

There's a lot of information that goes into being responsible pet owners, and that's why we always advocate for just doing your research on animals.

Because if nothing else, there's a lot of cool facts you can learn about animals spiders, especially.

The Slice from PBS North presented by the Teberg fund.