Customs officials in Germany made a creepy crawly discovery — about 1,500 young tarantulas stuffed inside plastic containers and hidden in chocolate sponge cake boxes.
The spider-filled cake boxes were shipped to Cologne Bonn airport in western Germany from Vietnam.
They said the shipment had a “noticeable smell” that didn’t smell like 15 pounds of chocolate sponge cake, The Associated Press reported.
“My colleagues at the airport are regularly surprised by the contents of prohibited packages from all over the world, but the fact that they found around 1,500 small plastic containers containing young tarantulas in this package left even the most experienced among them speechless,” customs spokesperson Jens Ahland said.
Typically, the customs officers see jewelry, cell phone cases or snake and crocodile leather items smuggled through the airport, according to The Washington Post.
Many of the spiders did not survive, while those that did were given to an expert tarantula handler, the AP reported.
The recipient of the shipment is being investigated for not paying the proper import duties and for not making the proper customs declarations, The Washington Post reported. The newspaper reported that the fact that some of the spiders were dead violated Germany’s animal welfare laws.
A value for the tarantulas was not provided, but they can be sold online for hundreds of dollars each, the Post reported.
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