Soil / Substrate mixtures

Hello.

Im just wondering what you guys use for substrate for:
-Ophistothalmus Glabrifons.
-Hadogenes paucidens.

Would like to know percentages of mixtures eg: 20% sand, 10% soil etc.....

Cheers,

Ant.

Hello,

for O. glabrifrons I use a substrate of excavator clay, sand and coco fibre at a mix of roughly, 30%clay/20%coco/50%sand. Wet the mix, pack it down and then leave to dry. Have as much substrate as your enclosure will allow. At least 4''-6''.

H. paucidens don't burrow so substrate is less important. Anything dry will be fine, although I have now started to mix many of my sandy substrates with excavator clay to keep it firm. Very few scorpions live on loose sand. An inch or so will be fine for these guys. The main thing is to provide them with rock stacks to squeeze into.

Callum B wrote:

Hello,

for O. glabrifrons I use a substrate of excavator clay, sand and coco fibre at a mix of roughly, 30%clay/20%coco/50%sand. Wet the mix, pack it down and then leave to dry. Have as much substrate as your enclosure will allow. At least 4''-6''.

+1
I kept my O.karooensis(same habitat and soil as O.glabrifrons) on 60% sand mixed with 40% wet peat and left to dry, it was +-20cm deep and they constructed very elaborate burrows.

50% Coco fiber and 50% sand work well for Hadogenes. But as Callum said, make sure you provide staked slate/tile etc. Mine actually seem to prefer to stay on top of the pile of slate instead of squeezing between them.

Thank you guys.

Ive put flatrocks on tightly compact coco fiber and sand. ive also made slate hide and one limestone hide, They love it.

Many thanks all for your help.

Ant

do you have to have clay in the tank for a desert hairy scorpion?

What other clay can i use?

Quote :

do you have to have clay in the tank for a desert hairy scorpion?

This subject seems to be cropping up quite a lot lately....The idea with mixing clay with sand is that the sand will stick together when dry allowing our scorpions to burrow into it without it collapsing. There's many ways of doing this including making your own consolidated sand, buying it premade or buying the ingredients separately and blending them together to make your own. Price wise the premade is the dearest, separate ingredients comes next and making it yourself using clay being the cheapest.
I make it myself using basic sand, modelling or sculpture clay (when brought it's moist) and water. Check out the thread called " H.arizonensis substrate" for a description on how to make it.

EDIT .. Duh, i've just noticed you've already asked the same questions in that thread..

How is it supposed to turn out? Mine just looks and feels like wet sand.

That's probably because it's still wet. Just put it in the tank, pack it down lightly, and let it dry. Once it's dry, it should be much more stable to burrow into than just loose sand.

Also, if you want to start a burrow for your scorpion, here is a very good "How To" guide by Den: [HOW TO] Making a pre-burrow for your desert burrowing species.

How do i fix it if it is not? What is it supposed to look like?

Quote :

How is it supposed to turn out? Mine just looks and feels like wet sand.

Quote :

How do i fix it if it is not? What is it supposed to look like?

Between those 2 quotes only a few hours have passed and i very much doubt it could be dry or even close to it by now.

It will just look like wet sand albeit maybe a touch darker considering the clay water is dirty brown in colour. Theres no rocket science here mate because all you've done (or should have done) is mix dirty clay water with sand.
There does seem to be some slight confusion with the type of clay used but at the end of the day clay is clay. If the clay was moist then you should have just blended a small fist sized chunk with approx 3 liters of water. If your clay is dry then i suppose you could just pulverise it and mix that with sand and then dampen it to get the same effect.

Put that damp sand in your enclosure, pack it down gently but not to hard and then allow it to dry. Don't fiddle with it as it's drying or you might disrupt the cohesive effect of the clay.

It'll probably take anything from a few days to a couple of weeks to dry depending on heat and ventilation.

If it dries out and you notice it's not sticking together then simply re-dampen it with a bit more clay water. Alternatively, if it dries and you think it's to hard then break it up, add more plain sand to dilute the mix and re-dampen it.

As it dries the water will evaporate leaving behind minute particles of clay that adhere the sand particles together. It won't really look any different from plain sand.

Ok, thanks.

Is it supposed to look like real sand when it is dry?

deserthairyscorpion1 wrote:

Is it supposed to look like real sand when it is dry?

Yes, it will look like normal sand.

Den wrote:

It won't really look any different from plain sand.

How do you know if it is not compact?

deserthairyscorpion1 wrote:

How do you know if it is not compact?

The sand would be too loose to burrow in.

If your not sure it's compact enough, wait for the sand to dry, and start a burrow for your scorp. If it just collapses and the sand is not sticking together, simply add more clay water and let it dry. If it's too hard, then break it up, add more plain sand to dilute the mix, re-dampen it, and let dry.