Pandinus Enthusiast

I have two Pandinus Imperators and two Pandinus Dictators. The Imperators came from Backwater Reptiles, although I've waded through countless poor reviews from the place I thought being in the market for Imperators it would make sense to give it a try. If they were poorly kept then surely they deserved liberation, and I stood to lose nothing more valuable than the life of a precious scorpion, so I took the chance. I'm pleased to report that they were successfully shipped overnight, they spent roughly ten hours being shipped from California to North Carolina and they arrived active and healthy. Having just traveled from one end of North American to the other I placed the two of them, babies at roughly 1" each, in a medium sized cricket keeper (8"x4"x6")with some misted cocoa fiber and a few oak leaves for temporary hides. I do not want to disturb them for the rest of the day. I'm a scorpion too and I don't care to be bothered much after I'm done travelling. I consider this adoption a success!

The two Pandinus Dictators I purchased through this website from MathiasVG. I'm quite impressed. Not only did the seller out-perform Backwaterreptiles by processing and shipping the scorpions more promptly with tracking information, but the scorpions themselves are vibrant to say the least. I have each of them in their own seperate "cricket keeper"(3"x6"x4") with misted cocoa fiber substrate and a couple of oak leaves for them to hide beneath.

All three of the "cricket keepers" are inside a 75 gallon aquarium with a substrate of large smooth stones and calcium sand, there are also a few pothos plants, and a couple ferns in there to help with humidity. The tank itself maintains a steady 77 degrees with 75% humidity without any change at all. There is a hood light above the tank which I've dimmed with a piece of mossy oak fabric over a piece of glass that fits perfectly above one side of the tank, the plants are on the brighter side.

Watching the baby Emperors explore their new tank makes me pretty happy, the Dictators seem to be pretty content hiding beneath the leaves. It's a good day in my scorpion lair.

17 days later, all of this has changed. I got some tips from the seller and altered the habitat immediately after I had made this post. Currently the two Emperors are in a zoomed bugarium, there is four inches of fine eco earth substrate and over head heat. This set up holds high humidity very well. The scorpions have burrowed against the back glass so I have full view of their lair. I drop a wax worm, a mealworm, cricket or dubia roach at the mouth of the burrow and presto, they snatch it up pretty fast. They are still very active and almost every night I can observe them hunting around 2 a.m.

The Dictators are in a ten gallon aquarium with six inches of fine eco earth substrate. This set up doesn't hold humidity as well as the bugarium but I'm still adjusting things gradually. I find the best approach is misting the sides of the glass or slowly pouring spring water into the substrate itself. Both Dictators are active and can generally each be seen around 2 a.m. They each have their own burrow, one on the warmer side, and the other on the cooler side.

Neither of my scorpion habitats have a false bottom, but I am currently putting another habitat together in a twenty gallon long tank that I plan to use the gravel/vertical tube false bottom method. Once the Dictators grow a little more I'll put them in the twenty gallon, and the Emperors in the ten gallon.

I have several Yellow Belly Sliders, and it is a real gem to catch them basking. Stealing a glimpse of the scorpions hunting is a comparable treat. Watching them lay in waiting to spring an ambush, or just move around a little has yet to lose it's thrill for me. I am interested in the Red Claw Emperor if anyone knows where they are available online.

After hours upon hours spent reading threads in this forum I have at last achieved an ideal habitat for my Dictators and Emperors, or at least a better one. I had the all too common issue of humidity loss, and scorpions who preferred life out of sight. Both of these issues were solved with information pried from the depths of this forum.

I didn't employ the false bottom technique before placing my scorpions in their habitats, and I really didn't want to empty their aquariums, displace them, and start from scratch so I pursued other options for humidity retention. Tin foil covering the top of the habitats has worked wonders. I cut a sheet large enough to wrap it's edges around the screen top, forming a snug fit on the aquarium, and then made an opening about the size of two square inches. This opening was just large enough to use my reptifogger to fill the habitats with fog. Using this approach I have maintained 85% humidity all day, with and without the 40 watt bulb I use as a heat source split over both habitats. I also retain a more stable heat gradient of 70-85 degrees during the day, and 70-80 degrees during the night, in a ten gallon tank.

The final change I've made has been using a water dish. I had been using water crystals which gel up when hydrated with the feeder crickets and dubia roaches in mind, and had been keeping the glass well misted so that the scorpions had access to beads of water just about all the time. Tonight they have water dishes.

The information I've been able to extract from this site has been invaluable in my learning experience as a scorpion keeper, and my scorpions and myself thank you all.

Another update on the Dictator/Emperor habitats. The aluminum foil became troublesome once I'd fed the scorpions a few times, it just proved to be a poor solution for me. I have since covered most of the top of the aquariums with a flat sheet of glass and placed a dome light with 40 watt incandescent bulb on the glass surface. The glass dims the light a bit and prevents the inside of the habitat from getting too hot, it also stabilizes the humidity inside the habitats without having to mist or fog the tank so much. I've allowed roughly three to four inches of the terrarium screen top to remain exposed so that there is some air circulation. The lights are timed and I've actually split two aquariums to one light, once the lights are off the tank temps gradually drop around ten degrees. Cooler more humid night cycles consistently draw the scorpions out, where they assume their ambush position and wait for a cricket/dubia roach.

For the new three dictators I adopted this week I made hides from the flat bottom of a large broken terra cotta pot, propping one edge up on two large smooth stones and allowing the rest of the shard to be buried slightly beneath the substrate surface. I placed the opening of each of the hides away from view for less light and more privacy. This has served as a pretty good mouth to their burrows, allowing them to dig during the day in nice, dark privacy.

In one of the habitats my dictators have burrowed against the side of the glass, allowing me to observe their activity beneath the surface. One thing I'll note is that sometimes I see the scorpions creeping across the burrow ceiling, upside down. That's about the coolest thing I've seen them do. Also one of the larger dictators that I adopted this week will use it's tail to support itself and it will climb up the aquarium in the corner and hang on the screen cover upside down. This same scorpion watches me, as in sits against the glass of the tank on the side where I am visible at my computer at night, and watches me. None of the other scorpions I have exhibit this behavior. I figure either she has a crush on me, or she wants to kill me.

I make it a point each night to get up around 3:30 a.m. and come into the pitch black room and try to catch a peek at them. I've used black duct tape and covered every light from surge protectors, computer lights or any other source of light in the room so that they have complete darkness at night. My scorpion habitats have evolved quite a bit over the last couple of months, it's been very satisfying experience.