Impending molt.Could use advice.

Hey guys, I got an incoming molt and need some help. My big female (Ms. Piggy) is frickin massive! I think I can see the edges of a couple segments popping loose underneath the metasoma. Any idea how soon she will pop? My biggest concern are the other "critters" in the enclosure. I still have a couple baby crix on the loose and I`m not sure I can get them all in time. Will they hurt her? I also have some pred. mites on the loose in addition to 2 - 3 gnats (they are drawn to the tank though it`s clean) what about them? I rarely see Piggy cause she is a good hole, so imagine my surprise when I seen her today ! Any advice is welcome, thanks guys! Oh btw, I like your scorp vids Brandon!

Baby crix shouldn't be too worrisome. Nothing else you've mentioned should raise concern in my opinion.

Are you positive your female isn't an adult? Can we see a pic?

TiTAN wrote:

Oh btw, I like your scorp vids Brandon!

Thanks, TiTAN!

Thanks for the replies. As for pics, I don`t have a way to post them from my phone. Going by the color of the telson this will probly be her final molt, it`s a deep creamy brown. I will see what I can do about using someone`s computer to post a pic but like I said she is a good pet hole.

Deep creamy brown, or light creamy brown? Dark sounds like it may be an adult.

I'd post a pic myself, but my server is currently down while I'm moving. :-/

I thought she was a 5i but I think she is actually a 6i. The telson is a caramel color. I`m fairly certain she isn`t gravid as she was in an all female enclosure when I bought her and her tank mate who is 1i behind. She has only gotten fat within the last 3 weeks. And I mean FAT. She has almost doubled in bulk. She still eats normally but isn`t so quick to get defensive. However I have noticed that over the same period of time kenzie (the small one) has taken a 180 in terms of attitude. She gets mean real quick where as she used to be real shy and placid. Impending molt or is she gravid?

I am not sure where this pic is from but I found it on google images and it said it was found through these forums. This is a reasonably close match to Piggy. The telson is almost exactly the same color, maybe a bit lighter than hers. I can`t really judge size from this pic though. I guess piggy is around 6.5 - 7 inches in length. Haven`t put the tape on her lol.

edit: Erm, how do you do img tags again? Am I missing something here?

what i do for uploading the images is upload my pictures to photobucket . com then when they are uploaded right click and go to the properties and then copy and paste the image loacation into the copied link into the image button:) hope that helps mate:)

Use BBCode IMG tags:

Checked the link . . . the color is halfway between what I expect for subadult and adult, but the shape of the body makes me think subadult.

However, if your scorp is really 7 inches in length, it sounds like adult.

Well, if I were to put her in my palm she would reach from the tip of my middle finger to the back of my palm. Last I checked that was about 8.25 inches. That would be including pedipalps. So she is right at about 7 inches. If it turns out she is gravid, I will need to get rid of some scorplings quick lol. I doubt she`s gravid though. She would have to have mated months ago. She was in an all female tank when I got her several months back.

A lot of WC emps are gravid already, and their gestation can last up to 18 months.

Also, most common measurements do not include the pedipalps.

As for the gestation period, i did not know it could be so long. That is amazing! And I know your not supposed to include pedipalps in measurements, that`s why I subtracted them. She`s roughly 7 inches excluding them. Thanks a bunch! I hope to get one or two H. arizonensis soon so I will be looking for some background on these guys in my next topic .

they arent communal.

What? Jordan, did you post on the wrong thread? These are emps we're talking about, and no one said anything about other scorps in the tank.

lol i was just saying the H. arizonensis that he mentioned at the end of his post arent communal. he said "i hope to get one or two" and was just saying that they cant be kept together.

*cough*EDDY*cough*.

*cough*WHAT???*cough*

Eddy's successfully kept H. arizonensis together; it was just a huge tank and everyone had their own burrow.

Ok, since they all had individual burrows, I wouldn't technically consider them communal, but they did well enough with a relatively high population density.

oh yea, and they were babies that he got to molt didn't he? still, its less stress (for the keeper) to just have the one or at least in individual tanks.