Damon spp.
Sold under its hobby name. This guide covers the group or trade name this fella is sold as, so the ranges fit the whole group. Start in the middle and watch how your animal settles in.
Giant Tailless Whip Spiders: Advanced Care Guide
Keeper Snapshot: A dramatic-looking but non-venomous amblypygid. Needs vertical cork, high humidity, and gentle no-grab maintenance. The real danger is broken legs and bad molts, not aggression.
Group: Industry StaplesDifficulty: Spice 2: BeginnerSetup: Humid vertical amblypygid setupHandling: Not recommended, delicate and easy to injure
Use This Guide Safely
- Confirm the exact animal. Match this guide to the species, locality, size, and life stage on your label. If the ID is uncertain, use the more conservative part of the range and ask before changing the setup.
- Change one thing at a time. Treat temperature and humidity as target zones, then watch posture, burrowing, drinking, feeding, and molt behavior before making another adjustment.
- Respect the handling boundary. If the guide says no handling, fast, defensive, or medically significant, plan transfers with catch cups, locked lids, and no bare hands. For serious bites, stings, or symptoms, seek emergency medical care.
Quick Snapshot
| Temperature | 75-82°F |
|---|---|
| Humidity | 70-80%, damp substrate, dry cork faces |
| Setup Type | Humid vertical amblypygid setup |
| Substrate | Moist substrate with tall cork slabs and leaf litter |
| Feeding | Small roaches/crickets weekly or every 10 days |
| Care Difficulty | Spice 2: Beginner |
| Handling | Not recommended, delicate and easy to injure |
Humidity zones: Very Low under 30% - Low 30-60% - Low-Moderate 40-70% - Moderate 60-80% - Moderate-High 70-85% - High 80%+ - Very High 90%+
Enclosure Format / Size Class
- Small secure juvenile setup
- Vertical bark grow-out
- Adult tall cork setup with molt clearance
Warnings First
- Whip legs are delicate. Never grab them.
- Cannibalism happens around molts and hunger, even in a communal group.
- Needs vertical molt space.
- High humidity without stagnant air.
- Can be communal only with careful sizing and feeding.
- Vent low on one wall and high on the opposite wall so humid air keeps moving instead of stagnating.
Simple Care
- Vertical cork is mandatory.
- Vents low on one wall and high on the opposite wall so air rises past the cork faces and keeps them dry.
- Keep humidity up with ventilation, not a sealed swamp.
- Shallow water dish with pebbles in it so small instars cannot drown.
- Feed small prey and protect molting animals from feeders.
Advanced Keeper Notes
Enclosure & Microclimate
- Use tall cork slabs with clearance for hanging molts and multiple vertical surfaces; amblypygids wedge into bark faces and crevices. A flat terrestrial setup is not suitable.
- Vent low on one wall and high on the opposite so air enters across the damp substrate, rises past the cork, and exits above. Damp cork is slippery cork.
- Hold 70-80% by keeping the substrate and leaf litter damp under free-flowing vents, never by sealing the enclosure.
- Judge by touch rather than by gauge. Substrate damp with no free water, cork faces dry to the touch, no persistent condensation on the upper glass.
- Keep a shallow water dish with pebbles or coarse grit so the waterline sits below the rim, and mist the substrate and base of the cork rather than the upper faces.
Feeding, Growth & Maintenance
- Feed appropriately small prey. Oversized crickets can injure a molting or newly molted whip spider.
- Molting: they molt hanging vertically. Do not disturb a hanging animal and do not feed until the new exoskeleton has firmed up.
- Groups can work in large, well-fed, similarly sized setups, but cannibalism still happens around molts and hunger.
Possible Origin / Range
- Likely native range: Tropical African forest and cave-edge habitats, varying by Damon species in the hobby.
- Habitat translation: Humid ventilated vertical cork habitat with molt clearance, small prey, and very gentle maintenance.
Advanced Keeper Details
- Most hobby Damon are sold under shifting species names. When in doubt, use general genus-level care.
- No venomous sting and no dangerous bite, but they are not handling animals. Leg loss and bad molts are the real welfare risks.
- Adult setups should open from the front or top in a way that doesn't force the animal off the cork each time.