Ummmm Houston... We have a problem!

Hey all... new to the site but will get around to making a proper intro post. As of last night... I have a problem though.


So last night I went to feed the two scorps I got about a month ago. Ive only had these since around the first of Sept and these are my first two scorps so its still a learning process. Both are B. jacksoni and are living in seperate containers.


I open up the first one and all is good.... drop in some crickets and moved on

I open up the second enclosure and there was supposed to be ONE scorp in there. Wrong!!!!






Ummmmm what do I do with all the babies? How do I care for them? How do I ship them? How do I house them?


Thanks for all your help

Ok... Ive been reading here a bit... and it says the babies are prone to cannabalism... should I go ahead and try to get them off the mothers back and into seperate containers?

Thanks

That's wrong. They are second instar. They will leave there mothers back soon. When they do it's easiest to remove the mother and then seperate the babies one by one. I use small plastic containers used for condiments and such. Put some moist coco fiber on the bottom and something for them to climb on like bark or cork. I poke a few small holes on the upper portion of the sides to provide a little ventilation. I recommend feeding them pinheads at least twice a week to get them to 3rd instar quick. The first few weeks is usually the most crucial.

let them start to come off the mothers back by themselves at 2i, once you can see they are all 2i and a couple have started coming off the back you can start carefully taking them off the mothers back with a Q-tip or something similar, chopsticks work well too. Best way is to get the mother into a tupperware container lined with papertowel so she wont have much room to move around so it'll make your job easier, might be adviseable to carefully hold her down with a different Qtip while extracting the young if she insists on moving around alot. Once all the babies are off put the mother back in her enclosure and start the task of seperating the young into seperate small containers, deli cups work perfect, have a small piece of bark/plywood/or something similar at an angle inside the "deli cup" for their molting process, same with moist eco earth type substrate, make sure theres breathing holes in the top of the container as well. For feeding pre-killed crickets and/or cut up mealworms work nicely.

Might be missing something but I'm pretty sure that's the standard for bark scorpions.

Have fun! This is one of the best parts of scorpion keeping, the babies!

Some recommedations for seperating them. I use a spoon to scoop the babies up. They can't climb it and kind of get stuck in the middle. Use something soft to move them around. They will likely be hiding in places you didn't think possible. Never assume you've got them all. I usually inspect the bark or whatever several times to make sure there are no babies.

Is there a thread on here that describes the stages of instar? What I currently have IS 2nd instar?

sorry for the noob questions... but I am really a noob to scorps.

are any of them coming off the mothers back?

just checked.... not yet... they are all piled up on top

my advice is wait until you can see them start to come off, like 2 or 3 coming off, then you know for sure its safe to seperate them. But i would get the containers ready beforehand.

They should all come off fairly quickly once a few do. Only a stubborn few will stay for a while. I generally wait. I have never had my B. jacksoni cannabilize any of their young unless they were still borns.

I saw a thread on here where someone used the plastic storage conatiner (like you would use for buttons or beads or something)... and I have several of these laying around. I think Im gonna use them for the babies.

perfect have fun, but dont forget the sides have to be just high enough for an angled piece of bark-like material.

I have used these in the past. They work great. Unfortunately I made the ventilation holes to big and it was almost impossible to keep the substrate moist. Make sure not to put the "climb" too high. They can use their tails to push them to the top and climb to the next container. Most of those type of containers are not flush between the top of the dividers and the lid.

well congrats on the unexpected new additions

Athlon2k2 wrote:

I have used these in the past. They work great. Unfortunately I made the ventilation holes to big and it was almost impossible to keep the substrate moist. Make sure not to put the "climb" too high. They can use their tails to push them to the top and climb to the next container. Most of those type of containers are not flush between the top of the dividers and the lid.

Thanks for the tip and thanks to everyone for the help

A word of advice from experience; and to the forefront it was a Babycurus gigas also. Do not surprise the mother like you already have getting "up close and personal" with the photo shoot. I did this with my B. gigas and she figured something was wrong and proceeded to "dump and eat" the babies; Internet sources advise this also. I just wanted to warn you on this as I was throughly disappointed to say the least. I even attempted to try and save as many as I could to no avail; the last two died today. They need their mother at least to 2 I and then, even sometimes stick around afterwards for a period of time.

I've heard that it's difficult to scare bark scorpions into cannibalizing their young; PaperTiger has a point, but I think his case was an unusual incident.

(It still sucked, though )

Thanks....as to the photo shoot.

I shoot with a Nikon D80..... and I dont have to get right up on them to get the shots. I can stack lenses. I was shooting with a 300mm macro with an extension tube and a 1.4x tele.

I would like to thank everyone again for the help

Just an update



They have started coming off mamma's back.

How do I need to supply water to these little guys?

a cap off a bottle of pop with a small rock in it filled with bottled water is just fine they also draw moister from the damp eco earth you have with them.

edit* nice lookin one there in ur pic grats

Just mist the enclosure from time to time, that's all that's needed.

Total count... 21 babies