What type of substrate(s) are you using? How do you provide water (bottle cap, mist, etc)?

Most of what you listed off aren't big on burrowing in captivity, especially as adults. Best thing you can do is try to start a burrow in the corner, but they may simply not want to burrow

At one time I had up to 20 new world T's of all sorts, most on 4 to 5 inches of coconut mulch or forest bed and I never had one take an intrest in burrowing. I even got curious and tried taking the hides away from a couple for a week or so to see if that would do it and none ever burrowed. It was only some of my terrestrial old world's that burrowed, which was kind of a mixed blessing. They tend to pop out at you when you least expect it

Toss lit matches at it.

NikiP - I've used a mixture of peat and vermiculite, potting soil and vermiculite, potting soil and peat, just potting soil alone, sand and potting soil, coconut husk fiber, etc, etc. I supplied water in a bottle cap or very shallow, small ceramic bowl. Water was always replaced and refilled daily. Could you suggest any New World species that do readily burrow in captivity?

sunspydr - Yeah dude, same here. What's funny is I've had more scorpions dig and create shallow burrows then any of my NW tarantulas.

C. fimbriatus is the first one that jumps out at me. Pretty sure all the Chilobrachys are obligate burrowers as well. C. fimbriatus is super cool. Skeleton markings, act like they are on crack, have urticating hair on their pedipalps, & do some amazing webbing around their burrows.

A month later

Nothing to contribute but I can say I am so looking forward to getting a tarantula soon...

We keep a lot of tarantulas; we keep them on coconut fiber that comes in the blocks. Start a little hole in the corner. but not many will burrow after getting some size on them. Mostly our slings and babies burrow.

NikiP - First off, thank you so much for the suggestion! Secondly, those pictures are AWESOME. Exactly what I'm looking for! I am terrible with scientific names... does that species you pictured have a common name? I googled C. fimbriatus, and it came up as the "Indian Violet", but it looks different from the picture you attached... is the picture attached a "Skeleton tarantula" E. murinus...?? I am no expert on T species, but I gotta know now, you peaked my interest big time...!

Killgore - You'll like them. I was hardcore into them for a while... I live far away from, well, anything, so getting them a couple crickets every week got old after a 30 mile drive inland, so I made the switch to snakes (having frozen mice on hand is a major plus). You'll need to muster up all your patience, but do yourself a favor and just sit and watch them for a while... they're fascinating, especially while they feed.

Creature Addiction - I had a king baboon sling about 10 years ago and that thing burrowed like mad. I've heard about that "start a hole in the corner" trick... does anyone know why they cease burrowing after reaching a certain size? They obviously don't do this in the wild... or we'd have far fewer tarantulas in the wild....

Yes, wow, rotflmao! I really had my head on backwards! You are correct on that being E. murinus (skeleton tarantula) Everything I said still applies to it. There's also E. cyanognathus (blue fanged skeleton) & E. uatuman (emerald skeleton.)

Forgive me, C. fimbriatus (Indian violet) is OW. And are also fun to keep!

The species you listed aren't obligate burrowers, even in the wild, they are terrestrial. Though they may use found burrows & may dig, it's not 100% in their nature like with obligate burrowers.

If you get more into OW there are a lot of fun burrowing species. Personally I prefer burrowers known for using more webbing with their burrows. Things like horned baboons & the Indian violet.

Nothing to forgive you for... you've been nothing but helpful! (I'm definitely going to look into Indian violets too!).

I've been researching E. murinus and, man, they are exactly what I've been looking for. I always knew of them, but never really sat down and did my research. Plus they are inexpensive, which is a plus. As much as I love B. smithi, they do put a hurtin' on the wallet. And now I know what a obligate burrower is. NikiP, what sort of substrate mixture would you suggest for E. murinus?? I see that they are tropical...

Burrowing seems to be a way of protecting themselves. Once they get a little size to them not much is going to mess with a good sized spider. And once they get older they seem to prefer hides more then burrowing. We provide our bigger spiders tree bark, ect to hide in. They seem happy. Like NikiP said just because they are terrestrial doesn;t mean they burrow. You can always specifically research burrowing species if that is what you are looking for...we have a fairly new species, or rare or whatever you want to call it that is a crazy burrower. I think its in the haplopelma class. I will check again and post for sure what the species is. My bf focus' mostly on the T's. I like them and I read up on them, but he's got so many in the bug room that I can't keep track anymore. LOL (I'm the snake and turtle girl:P)

Peat or a peat/vermiculite mix works. Peat is great for high humidity enclosures & these are a swamp species Youngsters tend to show arboreal behaviors, but generally do settle down & burrow.

If you do decide to make the step into OW, every collection needs a P. murinus, orange starburst baboon aka OBT (orange bitey thing.) These are very opportunistic. An super cheap! The most fun is to get several & give them different setup to see what they do. Like 25% soil/75% free space, 50% soil/50% free space, & 75% soil/25% free space. Guaranteed webbing & digging.

I kind of want to get a flame leg again. Hmm.