I recently got a newborn tarantula (Aphonopelma "new river" Rust Rump). He's about 1/4".. But he refuses to eat. I've tried flightless fruit flies, pinhead crickets.. He just walks away from them, almost as though he's scared. Is he going to molt soon, or should I be worried?

As long as he has a shallow water dish (like a small vial lid - no sponges though, they just grow bacteria) so he can't get dehydrated, he'll be fine. He may be coming up on a molt - if so, be sure to remove any and all prey items if he doesn't eat them after a few hours. They can feed on a molting or freshly molted T and kill it. Slings molt a lot more frequently than adult or juvie tarantulas.

Just as a side note: Some breeders do leave the sacs with the mom until they hatch but it's all personal preference. We prefer to pull the sacs and incubate the entire sac in our Mechanical Mom or, if it's developed enough, just open the sac and incubate the eggs or eggs w/ legs - whichever is in there. It always works well for us. But there isn't any kind of separation anxiety that a tarantula goes through or a time when it's "too early" to take them from the mother. They aren't like some animal parents and they can and do eat their own young at times (including entire sacs).

Many years keeping and breeding hundreds of tarantulas.

Okay, first of all. DONT be scared, its just a newborn, which sadly to say, doesnt eat as much. Try feeding it again, if he refuses to eat, maybe take him to the vet.

best of luck.

the internet.....google?wikipedia?

maybe you separated him from his mom to early