ID Turkish specimen

My son reckons this is Androctonus crassicauda. About 8-10cm long, found on lightly wooded mountainside in W Turkey near Fethiye. Is he right? the tail doesn't look very fat to me.

Looks more like Euscorpius concinnus

Thanks for replying. Looking at Wikipedia (I know, a poor source) they are up to 5cm. I'm sure this was a good bit bigger than that, maybe it's just my poor memory!

Pincers look too large, body too short and round and tail too thin for it to be Androctonus

It is almost definitely Protoiurus kraepelini. According to the paper by Kovarik et al http://www.science.marshall.edu/fet/euscorpius/p2012_143.pdf this is the species of Iurus/Protoiurus found in this part of Turkey.

It's absolutely definitely an Iurus/Protoiurus spp. anyway.

Awesome find. This is my favourite species of scorpion.

i agree it does look like a Protoiurus sp but it's very dark compared to the one i have.
is there much colour variation with these scorpion's?
this is my Protoiurus kraepelini, the body is much lighter than the one you found

Is yours a juvenile/sub-adult Chris? My young'uns have a lighter colouration than my adults, and going by the size stated of the one pictured in the original post it's probably an adult. Colour also seems to vary slightly between individuals.

Adult



Adult



3i with mum

Great looking scorpions! Didnt know this species existed in Turkey.

Thanks for all this info guys. The locals in the area only seem to recognize black scorpions and brown ones and say that stings from the black ones are the worst. They definitely hospitalise people, a guy we met had camped with some friends and one had just got out of hospital after a bite from one that had gotten into their tent. Could this species be the culprit?

Not sure on its age i bought a friends collection an he didnt even know what it was guessing its a juvi though as its only about 2-2 1/2" long.
My friend got stung by it on the finger an said within 10 minutes his arm up to his elbow swelled up loads an was extremley painfull

john@dalrymple.me.uk wrote:

Thanks for all this info guys. The locals in the area only seem to recognize black scorpions and brown ones and say that stings from the black ones are the worst. They definitely hospitalise people, a guy we met had camped with some friends and one had just got out of hospital after a bite from one that had gotten into their tent. Could this species be the culprit?

The short answer is that no, that particular species of scorpion is not the "culprit."



The long answer is that the medical significance of scorpions has been greatly exaggerated to the point of where people judge toxicity based on color, size, and even that it's simply as scorpion. That's not to say there aren't potentially dangerous scorpions, there are. However, only about 25-30 of around the 1,500-2,000 species described are considered medically significant. The genera that contain medically significant species are Androctonus, Buthus, Centruroides, Hottentotta, Leiurus, Mesobuthus, Parabuthus, Rhopalurus, and Tityus. There are two non-buthid species that are medically significant. These are Hemiscorpius lepturus (venom has a strong necrotic effect) and Nebo hierochonticus. The venom of the latter has reportedly caused hemorrhaging and necrosis in mice. . . however, the effects of the sting of this species on humans may be totally negligible.

Just because a scorpion is black does not mean that it's dangerous.

An easy way to roughly determine how "dangerous" a scorpion is would be to look at the size ratio of the telson/metasoma to the chela/pedipalps.

Scorpions with larger pedipalps and a relatively small metasoma tend to be relatively harmless; they use their pedipalps to crush their prey and defend themselves much more than they use their venom; hence their metasomas are smaller and their venom less toxic.

On the other hand, scorpions with small pedipalps and large metasomas tend to have more toxic venom, hence they use their venom for prey capture and defense much more readily.

Thanks for spending the time to give that detailed answer. These creatures get a "bad press" in the area and a probably little understood by the locals. I got the feeling that they were all treated as pests.

john@dalrymple.me.uk wrote:

Thanks for spending the time to give that detailed answer. These creatures get a "bad press" in the area and a probably little understood by the locals. I got the feeling that they were all treated as pests.

Scorpions are reacted to like that.