By the time Rosie emerged from the backrooms of the Butterfly Pavilion in Westminster for her afternoon meet-and-greet, the line of guests eager to hold the famed tarantula had already wrapped around the room and into the hallway.
Children bounced on their feet and pulled on their parents’ arms as Calais LeJeune, an educator and tarantula handler at the Butterfly Pavilion, carried Rosie past the line to the corner exhibit, where people can sit and welcome the spider to walk across their hand. For now.
LeJeune, who has worked nearly 8 years with Rosie, said she’s seen someone terrified of the spiders every hour she’s been in the tarantula exhibit. From toddlers to retirees, the guests stare at her from across the room as she coaxes Rosie and Goldie to walk on the backs of people’s hands. The timid guests walk in and out of the room, and at times have yelped, before eventually building up their bravery and getting in line.
Rosie, a Denver star and a household name across Colorado, has introduced millions of guests to the world of invertebrates since she arrived at the Butterfly Pavilion in 1995. Now, nearly three decades later, she’s taking eight steps back from the spotlight and into a new burrow.
“Her role might be changing, but she’s still going to be here,” LeJeune said. “She’s still going to be inspiring all of us in the same ways, just not from the palm of our hands.”
Starting Sept. 7, the Butterfly Pavilion will be sunsetting its tarantula-handling program and Rosie, the famous Chilean Rose Hair tarantula, will transition into a new home behind glass.
“Rosie and the tarantulas have been wonderful ambassadors for years and have done a lot of incredible work, but there are so many incredible invertebrate stories and other animals that have never gotten the opportunity to shine because we’ve always had this really bright star,” Director of Animal Collections Sara Stevens said.
Instead of the current meet-and-greet setup, Rosie’s corner in the Butterfly Pavilion’s survival exhibit will be converted into a glass enclosure where visitors can see her engage with her natural environment, Stevens said.
Butterfly Pavilion President and CEO Ryan Welch said the decision was a “no-brainer.”
“We want to be a leader in invertebrate research,” Welch said. “It’s … a core piece of who we are as an organization, and this is how that comes to life, right? Nobody is looking at the care of tarantulas in the same way that we are.”
Staff began “taking a hard look” at the tarantula handling experience two years ago, Stevens said. It started with introducing alternative species, like Goldie the Chaco Golden Knee tarantula, and looking for younger specimens to ease the burden on the tarantulas playing Rosie.
That’s one not-so-secret fact at the Butterfly Pavilion, Stevens said — roughly 120 tarantulas have played the iconic role of Rosie before retiring and being swapped out.
The Butterfly Pavilion currently houses 98 Rosies, but only 37 of those are old enough to be handled, and they don’t all have the personality for it. That doesn’t mean they’re aggressive, Stevens said, but that they’re not as adaptable to the experience and can be flighty, which isn’t a good trait for a public exhibit.
Tarantulas need to be at least 10 years old to be handled, so rearing a new cohort of Rosies could take up to a decade. And finding adult spiders ready to go on display is difficult — they’re highly coveted and expensive, Stevens said.
Tarantulas get nervous, just like the guests, and tell their handler when they want to be done for the day, Stevens said. Some stop walking on hands or turn lethargic. Others kick hairs onto the awaiting hands like porcupines. None of them bite.
When the spiders start transitioning out too quickly and too often, they’re retired.
A handful are transferred to other programs or exhibits in the Butterfly Pavilion, but more are sent to other zoos and collections across the country.
“What we were finding with our aging tarantulas is they were telling us more and more frequently that they didn’t want to be handled,” Stevens said.”Over time, even with getting the new Goldies into the rotation, there just wasn’t a way for us to continue the experience as is.”
Butterfly Pavilion staff spent years creating their own metrics and data to track the impact of the meet-and-greets on the tarantulas, Stevens said. There was no pre-existing research they could rely on to inform their decision.
“We’ve had to use brand new science and data and really do the work ourselves, because it just doesn’t exist,” Stevens said. “Invertebrate welfare is vastly understudied, despite making up 97% of all animal species.”
Guests are invited to visit Rosie in her new exhibit starting Sept. 8 and celebrate their favorite Rosie memories online using #ThanksRosie.
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